autumn 1969

how many i wonder read eliot for pleasure
the faber book of modern verse with devotion
at thirteen with a real library as treasure
while others looked at it as work the notion
did not enter my mind there was so much
to find so much to read the deepest sense
of exploration the need to reach and touch
all that creation all that truth without pretense
no need for magic with those words of power
opening worlds and letting infinite space
into a nutshell i still regard each short hour
as not enough i'd found at last the place
where i could stand at par with them that know
and let my thought in those deep waters flow