Frank William Finney is a poet and retired lecturer from Massachusetts who taught literature in Thailand for twenty-five years. His poems have appeared in Penumbra, The Purposeful Mayonnaise, and VerbalArt, among others. He is the author of The Folding of the Wings (Finishing Line Press, 2022) and other collections.
“I borrowed the title ‘There Where It Is’ from Robert Frost’s poem ‘Mending Wall,’ from his second collection, North of Boston, published in 1914.”
“‘I Agree with Emily’ responds to sentiments expressed in Emily Dickinson’s ‘There is no Frigate like a Book (1286).'”
“we do not need the wall . . .”
—Robert Frost
So instead, my neighbour
sunk stakes between yards
and tied them together
with frizzy twine
to make sure my mower
would toe the line.
Now passersby
can surely see
how green
he keeps his property,
except
on those spots
where his dog likes to pee.
I’m one who loves
to touch the trees
to saddle tramp
the saddle stitch;
to feast a finger
perfect bound.
I, too, am one
who loves to feel
a velvet page
turn ancient road
that leads to sudden
villages
that furnish us
with lust and ale
and send us trembling
towards a sea
where ships are waiting
at the pier
to land us
worlds away.
