H. P. Lovecraft: "Alienation"

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"Idag tar vind och regn guldmynt ur kronorna", skriver min pappa i mitt brev. En sådan kongenial höstbild

Så far kanske är en omedveten poet. En mer medveten poet, på gott och ont, var för sin del H. P. Lovecraft. De 36 sonetterna i "Fungi From Yuggoth" är ibland lite knöliga, orden har skavts in för att passa versmåttet ("from the fixt mass whose sides the ages are"). Men ibland får han såklart till det, får det att svänga - som i följande drapa som inte för inte bär sin titel, "Alienation". Den kan sägas illustrera HPL:s dagboksanteckning från något av de sista åren: "I am more and more of a stranger among those who are still men"...

His solid flesh had never been away,
for each dawn found him in his usual place,
but every night his spirit loved to race
through gulfs and worlds remote from common day.

He had seen Yadith, yet retained his mind,
and come back safely from the Ghooric zone,
when one still night across curved space was thrown
that beckoning piping from the voids behind.

He waked that morning as an older man,
and nothing since has looked the same to him.
Objects around float nebulous and dim -

false, phantom trifles of some vaster plan.
His folk and friends are now an alien throng
to which he struggles vainly to belong.