Monday's Poetry: "The Dangling Conversation"

by Pa Rock
Poetry Appreciator

Alexa and I were enjoying some quality time with Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel a few days ago, when she came up with one of the most beautiful songs ever recorded by the guitarred young poets.  The Dangling Conversation is a brief gaze into the lives of a pair of lovers whose ability to communicate is fading.  One reads Emily Dickinson and the other has a penchant for Robert Frost, two voices as divergent as the evolving lives of the lovers themselves.

Paul Simon wrote these lyrics in 1966, my senior year in high school, a half-century ago.  His words remain as poignant and insightful today as they were then - retaining their truth while rocketing down the chute of time.

Please enjoy as you remember . . .


The Dangling Conversation
by Paul Simon

It's a still life water color,
Of a now late afternoon,
As the sun shines through the curtained lace
And shadows wash the room.
And we sit and drink our coffee
Couched in our indifference,
Like shells upon the shore
You can hear the ocean roar
In The Dangling Conversation
And the superficial sighs,
The borders of our lives.

And you read your Emily Dickinson,
And I my Robert Frost,
And we note our place with bookmarkers
That measure what we've lost.
Like a poem poorly written
We are verses out of rhythm,
Couplets out of rhyme,
In syncopated time
And The Dangling Conversation
And the superficial sighs
Are the borders of our lives.

Yes we speak of things that matter,
With words that must be said,
"Can analysis be worthwhile?"
"Is the theater really dead?"
And how the room is softly faded
And I only kiss your shadow,
I cannot feel your hand,
You're a stranger now unto me
Lost in The Dangling Conversation
And the superficial sighs
In the borders of our lives.