Today I posted three separate poems (in 3 separate blog posts) by Barber Bancroft that were written in his late teens. His impact on my life during those high school and college years was considerable.
I wrote this poem three weeks after Barber's untimely death while teaching his World Literature class at Auburn University.
I Could Not Stand Before You
"Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question …
Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”
Let us go and make our visit."
T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.
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I could not stand before you today,
if I had not met Barber Bancroft.
Once upon a time,
when living in the teenage crucible
he took heat and applied
it to my amorphous self,
the one gone underground to
avoid formation.
He bound me to the forge,
watched the dross burn away
then,
with determined mind
tempered by love
-waited –
for the white hot
moment to bring down
the foundry hammer.
How the sparks did fly when the hammer fell!
The solitary bell like ring
of the metallic maul
rose an octave,
paused,
then caroled as he
sculpt,
stamped,
forged,
and pounded a fiery brand
that only we two could see.
Today I wear that brand with
a grief flavored joy,
and an intimate awareness of
my responsibility to translate him
with
each new day,
each new step,
each new breath.
Rod Scott - November 24, 2004
RIP Barber Bancroft
August 9, 1956 - November 5, 2004
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The writer Robert Smallwood created a blog post called "Remembering Barber Bancroft" that contains comments and poems about people's memories and impressions of Barber.
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