Ferlinghetti Blues lyrics

It is the voice

Of the fourth person singular

It is the voice

Within the voice of the turtle

It is the face

Behind the face of the race

Poetry is made of night-thoughts

If it can tear itself away from illusion

It will not be disowned

Before the dawn

Poetry is made by evaporating

The liquid laughter of youth

Poetry is a book of light at night

Dispersing clouds of unknowing

It hears the whisper

Of elephants

And sees how many angels dance

On the head of a pin

And how many angels and devils dance on the head of a phallus

It is a humming a keening

A laughing a sighing at dawn

A wild soft laughter

It is the final gestalt

Of the immagination

Poetry should be emotion

Recollected in emotion