I've become so enamored of all of the participating "Best Shot" writers that I miss people when they don't show up and stalk their blogs. Peter Swanson of Armchair Audience recently joined the informal "best shot" group and when I noticed no Singin' in the Rain post last Wednesday, I started clicking around his blog only to discover he's a published poet, and a fine witty one, too. He often writes about the movies and is currently completing work on a sonnet sequence about all 53 Alfred Hitchcock movies. 53 !!!
With his permission I'm sharing his 2007 poem inspired by Oscar winner David Niven which was originally originally published in The Vocabula Review.
"David Niven: a Villanelle"
-by Peter Swanson
There is a better world to live in:
Dressed for dinner in black tie,
Debonair like David Niven.With shoulders wide and sun-browned skin,
The mustache trimmed, the bluest eye.
There is a better world to live in,Where formality’s a given,
A place where you, in black, and I,
As neatly dressed as David Niven,Drink silver cocktails shaken
Very cold and very dry.
There is a better world to live in,Of string quartets, of My Blue Heaven,
Of clouds and girls that never cry,
Of men that look like David Niven,Or close enough, something akin,
Beneath some starry, starry sky.
There is a better world to live in,
Dead and gone like David Niven.