“Hartford,” from Wedge of Words: Poems, by Frederic Will (1962)

Hartford

Where nothing’s uninsured except the slow
Still commotion of spring. That seems the least
Of certainties. (Who called it from the ground,
In parks, or gardens long more orderly?)

Where in the finest print calamities
Are exorcised, where death, as any housewife
Knows, has lost its sting, and pays at last.
(Where policies are read before each meal.)

Where spring, an accident that’s never covered,
Creeps libidinous from house to house,
And trickles, when the last martini’s gone,
Into the actuary’s careful blood.

from Wedge of Words: Poems, by Frederic Will
Austin: University of Texas Press, 1962

Available on the Internet Archive: Link

This is one in a series of neglected poems taken from the Internet Archive.