Sign Inventory 1 Week 6

                                           October Tune

A stuffed quail

on the mantelpiece minds its tail.

The regular chirr of the old clock’s healing

in the twilight the rumpled helix.

Through the window, birch candles fail.

For the fourth day the sea hits the dike with its hard horizon.

Put aside the book, take your sewing kit;

patch my clothes without turning the light on:

golden hair

keeps the corner lit.

                                                                               Joseph Brodsky

-First stanza has 5 lines and the rhyme scheme of a limerick (aabba), but I’m not sure of its humor, nonsensical perhaps.

-5 lined stanzas made up of 5 sentences.

-The title “October Tune” implies sound, yet the poem itself is strangely possessed by illumination: “twilight,” “candles,” “horizon,” “light,” “golden hair,” and “lit” all make their presence known.

- Again the number 5 makes an appearance with the number of illuminant images.

-However, it is “the fourth day” that the ocean beats the rocky banks.

-Active throughout.