Explore "Three Portraits" by Maxwell Bodenheim on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
/ I. Withdraw your hair from the simulated / Interest of the moon; / Take every tenuous shadow / From the aimless tongues of these trees / And darken your speech until it attains / A fickle and fantastic / Acquaintance with the eccentric night; / Disarrange your dress and make it / A subtle invitation to nakedness. / Remove your shoes and stockings / So that your feet may enjoy / An embarrassed soliloquy with the grass; / Place the palm of your hand / Lightly against your nose, / Following the slope of some grotesque feeling. / Devise these careful affronts / To the heavier intentions / Of thought and emotion, and gratefully / Accept your title of minor poet.
/ Only trees with long roots caught by hills / Will recognize your importance.