De Kooning’s Gruesome Elegy For Robert Frost

Who was it that butchered Robert Frost,
cut him up into ice cubes,
butchered his horse there in the snowy woods?

Blood-red snow could not be budged
by snarling wind,
wolves came by to sniff,

but the pack hurried off into the darkness.
Canine thoughts of self-preservation
eminent in the falling flakes.

The farmer whose house was not so near
told the police he hadn’t seen a thing,
had only heard the hissing of the snow.

But Frost had miles to go before he slept,
Frost had miles to go before he slept
dismembered in the Bates Motel.