#MIDDLEBURY
Collectors
Marion Strobel
The barnacle of crowds –
Like a tuck
On a finished skirt, unnoticed –
He collected his material
Covertly:
A ragpicker,
A scavenger of words.
And the gleanings
Of his hearing
He would costume
In his own words,
And parade before
A listener.
So that now,
Across the tea-cup,
He was telling
Of his research,
Of his study,
Of his deep thought-out
Conclusions.
And the lady,
Connoisseur of old thoughts
Bound in new gilt bindings,
Smiled approval
At the finding
Of another curio
To place
In her long gallery.
About this poem
“Collectors” was published in Others (Volume 5, Number 6) in July of 1919.
About Marion Strobel
Marion Strobel was born in 1895. She lived and worked in Chicago as a poet, fiction writer, critic and editor. Her collections of poetry include “Once in a Blue Moon” (Harcourt Brace, 1925) and “Lost City” (Houghton Mifflin, 1928). She died in 1967.
The Academy of American Poets is a nonprofit, mission-driven organization, whose aim is to make poetry available to a wider audience. Email The Academy at poem-a-day@poets.org.
This poem is in the public domain. Originally published in Poem-a-Day, www.poets.org. Distributed by King Features Syndicate.
