Alice Notley

 

lex Katz 
Alice Notley, From the Portfolio "Face of the Poet", 1978
Color aquatint, 4 colors on J. Green Hotpress Paper Printer: Prawat Laucheron, N
14 1/2 in. x 19 in. (36.83 cm x 48.26 cm)

Sonnet

The late Gracie Allen was a very lucid comedienne,

Especially in the way that lucid means shining and bright.

What her husband George Burns called her illogical logic

Made a halo around our syntax and ourselves as we laughed.

George Burns most often was her artful inconspicuous straight man.

He could move people about stage, construct skits and scenes, write

And gather jokes. They were married as long as ordinary magic

Would allow, thirty-eight years, until Gracie Allen's death.

In her fifties Gracie Allen developed a heart condition.

She would call George Burns when her heart felt funny and fluttered

He'd give her a pill and they'd hold each other till the palpitation

Stopped—just a few minutes, many times and pills. As magic fills

Then fulfilled must leave a space, one day Gracie Allen's

               heart fluttered

And hurt and stopped. George Burns said unbelievingly to the doctor,

               "But I still have some of the pills."