And here it is, the last poem I submitted to Atop the Cliffs. I’ll get around to writing some new ones…eventually. Whenever it is that the inspiration to write more poetry strikes me. And by that I mean whenever I get the inspiration to write relatively high-brow poetry—I doubt the new world we’re seeking to create wants my poems about whores and pinball machines.

As for the inspiration for this piece? It was, ahem, inspired by my relations with a few women during my college years, when I was first experiencing the pleasures of sex for the first time and, well, let’s just say that any masculine writer worth his salt will admit to not being some infallible stud that has never struck out with a woman—I certainly have in the past; but hey, how else am I supposed to get inspiration to write?

You can read this poem here on Atop the Cliffs, as well as many other fine poems on Arthur Godwell’s website.

—

Love’s Reproach by Larsen Halleck

The setting sun
Whispering wind
The twilight orchestra’s surroundings
Exhaled sighs
Meeting lips
Of love’s bloom, the world sings
Bodies together
Arms entwined
As the sky bursts into flame
A passionate embrace
Soft nothings exchanged
As he gazes into the eyes of a dame
Another night
His love ignited
Her love for him neglected
Seeking warmth
And a flurry of kisses
He finds his attentions rejected

—

Or, if you must be that guy…Hypergamy: The Poem!

A short poem, to be sure, but I think we can all agree on its relevance and how it expresses a sort of HL Mencken-esque view on how men and women view romance. “Women are the pragmatists, and men are…doltish…romantics” and all that—and in particular a young man. More specifically, the sort of doltish and romantic young man that I myself was not too long ago.