Roethke Outtakes - 4

Here is one more Roethke poem for the day with an early version of the last stanza in da middle. Also, two versions of "the carriages" line in stanza one. The early version there in parens.

On the Road to Woodlawn

I miss the polished brass, the powerful black horses,
the drivers creaking the seats of the baroque hearses,
the high-piled floral offerings with sentimental verses (,)
(-As the carriages passed you smelled sweat and flowers’
perfume)
The carriages reeking with varnish and stale perfume.

(Now, as if performing a task that disgraces,
the black-flagged cars, filled with anonymous faces,
hurry to where a man’s last resting place is.
--As if in the cemetery there was no sufficient room.)

I miss the pallbearers momentously taking their places,
The undertaker's obsequious grimaces,
The craned necks, the mourners' anonymous faces,
—And the eyes, still vivid, looking up from a sunken room.