unrequited love poem - sierra demulder

Unrequited Love Poem 
by Sierra DeMulder

You will be out with friends
when the news of her existence
will be accidentally spilled all over
your bar stool. Respond calmly
as if it was only a change in weather,
a punch line you saw coming.
After your fourth shot of cheap liquor,
leave the image of him kissing another woman
in the toilet.

In the morning, her name will be
in every headline: car crash, robbery, flood.
When he calls you, ignore the hundreds of ropes
untangling themselves in your stomach.
You are the best friend again. He invites
you over for dinner and you say yes
too easily. Remind yourself this isn’t special,
it’s only dinner, everyone has to eat.
When he greets you at the door, do not think
for one second you are the reason
he wore cologne tonight.

In his kitchen, he will hand-feed you
a piece of red pepper. His laugh
will be low and warm and it will make you
feel like candlelight. Do not think this is special.
Do not count on your fingers the number
of freckles you could kiss too easily.
Try to think of pilot lights and olive oil,
not everything you have every loved about him,
or it will suddenly feel boiling and possible
and so close. You will find her bobby pins
laying innocently on his bathroom sink.
Her bobby pins. They look like the wiry legs
of spiders, splinters of her undressing
in his bed. Do not say anything.
Think of stealing them, wearing them
home in your hair. When he hugs you goodbye,
let him kiss you on the forehead.
Settle for target practice.

At home, you will picture her across town
pressing her fingers into his back
like wet cement. You will wonder
if she looks like you, if you are two bedrooms
in the same house. Did he fall for her features
like rearranged furniture? When he kisses her,
does she taste like wet paint?

You will want to call him.
You will go as far as holding the phone
in your hand, imagine telling him
unimaginable things like you are always
ticking inside of me and I dream of you
more often than I don’t.
My body is a dead language
and you pronounce
each word perfectly.

Do not call him.
Fall asleep to the hum of the VCR.
She must make him happy.
She must be
She must be his favorite place in Minneapolis.
You are a souvenir shop, where he goes
to remember how much people miss him
when he is gone.

to m.b. - joseph brodsky

To M.B.
by Joseph Brodsky (tr. George Kline)

When I embraced these shoulders, I beheld
the room as it was now revealed beyond us.
I saw how a straight chair pushed from the wall
had blended with the brilliant glow behind it.
The huge bulb in the lamp was far too strong --
its fierce glare made worn furniture look hollow;
the threadbare cover of the sofa shone
so greenly brown as to seem almost yellow.
The table stood deserted, and the floor
lay gleaming, while the stove seemed dark; a dusty
wood frame held a stiff landscape. The sideboard
appeared to be alone among the living.
A moth, aflutter in the this empty blaze,
shook my fixed stare out of its frozen orbit.
If any ghost had tried to haunt this place,
he must have left, for surely he abhorred it.

favor of alexander balas - c.p. cavafy

Favor of Alexander Balas
by C.P. Cavafy (tr. Dalven)

O, I am not upset that a wheel of my chariot
is broken, and I have lost a foolish victory.
I will spend the night with fine wines
and amid lovely roses. Antioch belongs to me.
I am the young man most glorified.
I am Balas's weakness, his adored one.
Tomorrow, you'll see, they'll say that the contest was unfair.
(But if I were coarse, and had ordered it in secret --
the flatters would have voted first prize even to my
crippled chariot.)

infidelity - c.p. cavafy

Infidelity
by C.P. Cavafy (tr. Dalven)

At the nuptial banquet of Thetis and Peleus
Apollo rose from the sumptuous marriage
table, and gave the newlyweds his divine blessing
for the offspring that would be born of their union.
He siad, "No sickness shall ever touch him and he
shall have a long, long life." -- When he spoke these words
Thetis rejoiced beyond measure, for the words
of Apollo who knew all about prophecies
seemed a guarantee for the life of her son.
And through the years when Achilles was growing up
and his fine looks were the glory of Thessaly,
Thetis remembered the words of the god.
But one day old men arrived with news
and they told of the slaying of Achilles at Troy.
And Thetis tore off her purple garments,
and she kept on tearing off and casting upon
the ground her bracelets and rings.
And in her lamentation she recalled the past;
and she asked what the wise Apollo was doing,
where was the poet wandering who speaks
so divinely at feasts, where was the prophet roaming
when they were slaying her son in the prime of his youth.
And the old men answered her that Apollo
himself had gone down to Troy,
and with the Trojans he had slain Achilles.

monotony - c.p. cavafy

Monotony
C.P. Cavafy (tr. Dalven)

One monotonous day follows another
identical monotony. The same things
will happen, they will happen again --
the same moments find us and leave us.

A month passes and ushers in another month.
One can easily guess the coming events;
they are those tedious ones of yesterday.
And the morrow ends by not resembling a morrow.

theatre impressions - wislawa szymborska

Theatre Impressions
by Wislawa Szymborska (trans. by Krynski & Maguire)

For me a tragedy's most important act is the sixth:
the resurrecting from the stage's battlegrounds,
the adjusting of wigs, of robes,
the wrenching of knife from breast,
the removing of noose from neck,
the lining up among the living
to face the audience.

Bows solo and ensemble:
the white hand on the heart's wound,
the curtsey of the lady suicide,
the nodding of the lopped-off head.

Bows in pairs:
fury extends an arm to meekness,
the victim looks blissfully into the hangman's eyes,
the rebel bears no grudge as he walks beside the tyrant.

The trampling of eternity with the tip of a golden slipper.
The sweeping of morals away with the brim of a hat.
The incorrigible readiness to start afresh tomorrow.

The entry in single file of those who died much earlier,
in the third, the fourth, or between the acts.
The miraculous return of those lost without a trace.
The thought that they've been waiting patiently backstage,
not taking off costumes,
not washing off makeup,
moves me more than the tragedy's tirades.

But truly elevating is the lowering of the curtain,
and that which can still be glimpsed beneath it:
here one hand hastily reaches for a flower,
there a second snatches up a dropped sword.
Only then does a third, invisible,
perform its duty:
it clutches at my throat.

"we believe books, music, poetry..." - anatoly sergeyevich steiger

"We believe books, music, poetry..."
by Anatoly Sergeyevich Steiger

We believe books, music, poetry;
We believe dreams that we see in our sleep.
We believe words...(Even those words
Which are spoken to console us,
Spoken from the window of a train)...

the face of a woman - adonis

The Face Of A Woman
by Ali Ahmed Said [a.k.a. Adonis] (trans. by Kamal Abu-Deeb)

I dwell in the face of a woman
who dwells in a wave
flung by the tide
to a shore that has lost its harbor
in its shells.
I live in the face of a woman
who murders me,
who desires to be
a dead beacon
in my blood sailing
to the very end of madness.

villanelle: the psychological hour - ezra pound

Villanelle: The Psychological Hour
by Ezra Pound

I
I had over-prepared the event,
that much was ominous.
With middle-ageing care
I had lain out just the right books.
I had almost turned down the pages.

Beauty is so rare a thing.
So few drink of my fountain.

So much barren regret,
So many hours wasted!
And now I watch, from the window,
the rain, the wandering busses.

"Their little cosmos is shaken"--
the air is alive with that fact.
In their parts of the city
they are played on by diverse forces.
How do I know?
Oh, I know well enough.
For them there is something afoot.
As for me;
I had over-prepared the event--

Beauty is so rare a thing,
So few drink of my fountain.

Two friends: a breath of the forest...
Friends? Are people less friends
because one has just, at last, found them?
Twice they promised to come.

"Between the night and morning?"

Beauty would drink of my mind.
Youth would awhile forget
my youth is gone from me.

II
("Speak up! You have danced so stiffly?
Someone admired your works,
And said so frankly.

"Did you talk like a fool,
The first night?
The second evening?"

"But they promised again:
'To-morrow at tea-time.'")

III
Now the third day is here--
no word from either;
No word from her nor him,
Only another man's note:
"Dear Pound, I am leaving England."

things that might have been - jorge luis borges

Things That Might Have Been
by Jorge Luis Borges (tr. A. S. Kline)

I think of things that weren't, but might have been.
The treatise on Saxon myths Bede never wrote.
The inconceivable work Dante might have had a glimpse of,
As soon as he’d corrected the Comedy’s last verse.
History without the afternoons of the Cross and the hemlock.
History without the face of Helen.
Man without the eyes that gave us the moon.
On Gettysburg’s three days, victory for the South.
The love we never shared.
The wide empire the Vikings chose not to found.
The world without the wheel or the rose.
The view John Donne held of Shakespeare.
The other horn of the Unicorn.
The fabled Irish bird that lights on two trees at once.
The child I never had.



Pienso en las cosas que pudieron ser y no fueron.
El tratado de mitología sajona que Beda no escribió.
La obra inconcebible que a Dante le fue dada acaso entrever,
Ya corregido el último verso de la Comedia.
La historia sin la tarde de la Cruz y la tarde de la cicuta.
La historia sin el rostro de Helena.
El hombre sin los ojos, que nos han deparado la luna.
En las tres jornadas de Gettysburg la victoria del Sur.
El amor que no compartimos.
El dilatado imperio que los Vikings no quisieron fundar.
El orbe sin la rueda o sin la rosa.
El juicio de John Donne sobre Shakespeare.
El otro cuerno del Unicornio.
El ave fabulosa de Irlanda, que está en dos lugares a un tiempo.
El hijo que no tuve.

in the heart of the desert - al-tirimmah

In the Heart of the Desert
by Al-Tirimmah (tr. Omar S. Pound)

A foolish man rides here
with my saddle
and on my camel.

elizabeth hoar - ralph waldo emerson

Elizabeth Hoar
by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Almost I am tempted to essay
For sympathetic eyes the portraiture
Of the good angels that environ me.
My sister is a Greek in mind & face
And well embodies to these latest years
The truth of those high sculptors old who drew
In marble or in bronze, on vase or frieze
The perfect forms of Pallas or the Muse;
Forms in simplicity complete
And beauty of the soul disdaining art.
So bright, so positive, so much itself,
Yet so adapted to the work it wrought
It drew true love, but was complete alone.
She seemed to commune with herself, & say,
I cannot stoop to custom & the crowd,
For either I will marry with a star,
Or I will pick threads in a factory.
So perfect in her action, one would say,
She condescended if she added speech.
Her look was sympathy, & though she spoke
Better than all the rest, she did not speak
Worthy of her. She read in many books,
And loved the Greek as t'were her mother tongue
She knew the value of the passing day
Thought it no mark of her virtue to be scornful
Or cry for better company, but held
Each day a solid good; never mistook
The fashionable judgment for her own.
So keen her perception that no judge or scribe
Could vie with her unerring estimate.
When through much silence & delay she spoke,
It was the Mind's own oracle, through joy
And love of truth or beauty so perceived:
Never a poor return on the self.

a traveler at night writes his thoughts - tu fu

A Traveler at Night Writes His Thoughts
by Tu Fu (tr. Watson)

Delicate grasses, faint wind on the bank;
stark mast, a lone night boat:
stars hang down, over broad fields sweeping;
the moon boils up, on the great river flowing.
Fame--how can my writings win me that?
Office--age and sickness have brought it to an end.
Fluttering, fluttering--where is my likeness?
Sky and earth and one sandy gull.

tale of the assyrian statue - mahmoud al-buraikan

Tale of the Assyrian Statue
by Mahmoud al-Buraikan (tr. Lena Jayyusi and Naomi Shihab Nye)


In a glass room
In a museum that squats
in a lost city that crouches
in a deserted land
on a vast continent
I live, elevated, confronting the eyes of men,
and paralyzing them.
At silence's end, I shake them off
the events of time, and the
terror of the ninth century.

Idol of Nineveh
Its Master.
In an inscrutable moment
My being emerged
to the echo of a chisel
in the hands of a sculptor
in the hall of stones and clay.

In terror, tribes of the dead
make me blood offerings.
How many voices
tremble with the nightmare in the cadence
of the chant
I was called many names
Scented with perfumes and essences,
Hung with rings
My eyes, two diamonds that pierce
the night,
come from mines whose secrets
no man has discovered.

Does Time admit to this memory?
I have seen the gentle moon
at night's beginning, heard the tumult
of the earthquake before the hour of ten.
I have seen the horses
invade women's cloisters
I saw the lances rise high
with skulls of men
I saw the sword's descent
I saw how the bride dances in the ceremony
of death,
and how suns extinguish
the storms of capitals.

Does Time admit to this memory?
The fall of castles and walls
drought and rains
wheat and iron
and the power of the sword, at which men stare
with awe, as it lies
in its leather scabbard?

Does Time admit
to that allusion?
The secret date for the death of a legend
and the beginning of an impossible undertaking,
the plagues of history,
cycles of unknown duration,
the blaze of fires coloring
faces, coloring the gardens and sky,
the will to power
the lust to destroy.

I have lost my jewels
been stripped of my rings,
my locks sheared
I've been rolled off my original base
moved from place to place
The owls and eagles spoke to me,
little boys climbed my ribs
A hammer was once tested on my body
I was tied with ropes,
dragged along, stretched out on my face,
behind a pair of mules.
Once I guarded a wall
Another time I stood at the gate of a palace
Marched in file in one of the armies,
Was abandoned in the desert,
spread out, to be washed by the gales,
for the hot sandstorms to dry out
my deepest chambers,
casting an eternal gaze,
my white sockets open
to the world of stars.

The sea recedes, only the shells remain
at the bottom of the earth
wind after wind
redistributes the red sands.
The ravens
have landed here, and meshed into the cycle of the horizon
Eagles' wings have fluttered
on my neck, then burned on the summits
of sand dunes.
Old wolves made a pillow of my body
as they passed by, fleeing to somewhere.
Caravans of thieves
took shade at my sides, where precious stones
left their mark, where ants built
the earthen kingdom of blind balance.

In the glass room
I stand erect, women stare
at my uncomplicated body,
(stare precisely at the center of the crotch)
children take delight
because my ear has fallen off, and my eyebrow is broken,
because in my chest
there is a gaping hole (so frightening in the light).
In the glass room
sound does not enter
the surface of death is not touched

Some men appear, and continue whispering,
perhaps about my left nail.
In the glass room
the worn-out fingers do not fall off
the sun does not penetrate, but the microscope does.
In the glass room alone
the solitary corpse stands erect.

nicholas, the expirimental dog - raymond queneau

Nicholas, The Experimental Dog
by Raymond Queneau (tr. Rexroth)

Nicholas
You ran away from the hospital
They told you you weren’t sick
You were just an animal
Nicholas
You didn’t know

Nicholas
They told you you were phthisick
Leprous, chorean, cholerick
You were enigmatick
Nicholas
They didn’t know

Nicholas
Everybody ran after you
They found you in the rue d’Bellechasse
Where you didn’t need to go
Nicholas
You didn’t know

Nicholas
You’ve got a kidney in your neck
Your aorta is full of holes
Incisions all over you
Nicholas
You didn’t know

Nicholas
You were really a man
Just like all of us
The pancreas in the gum
The stomach in the rum
Some brains in the heart
The lungs coming out of the fingers
The intestines coming out of the nose
An ear in the liver
Just like all of us
Nicholas
And just like you
Nobody knows.

the room - vladimir nabokov

The Room
by Vladimir Nabokov

The room a dying poet took
at nightfall in a dead hotel
had both directories -- the Book
of Heaven and the Book of Bell.

It had a mirror and a chair,
it had a window and a bed,
its ribs let in the darkness where
rain glistened and a shopsign bled.

Not tears, not terror, but a blend
of anonymity and doom,
it seemed, that room, to condescend
to imitate a normal room.

Whenever some automobile
subliminally slit the night,
the walls and ceiling would reveal
a wheeling skeleton of light.

Soon afterwards the room was mine.
A similar striped cageling, I
groped for the lamp and found the line
"Alone, unknown, unloved, I die"

in pencil, just above the bed.
It had a false quotation air.
Was it a she, wild-eyed, well-read,
or a fat man with thinning hair?

I asked a gentle Negro maid,
I asked a captain and his crew,
I asked the night clerk. Undismayed,
I asked a drunk. Nobody knew.

Perhaps when he had found the switch
he saw the picture on the wall
and cursed the red eruption which
tried to be maples in the fall?

Artistically in the style
of Mr. Churchill at his best,
those maples marched in double file
from Glen Lake to Restricted Rest.

Perhaps my text is incomplete.
A poet's death is, after all,
a question of technique, a neat
enjambment, a melodic fall.

And here a life had come apart
in darkness, and the room had grown
a ghostly thorax, with a heart
unknown, unloved -- but not alone.

many red devils - stephen crane

"Many red devils..." 
by Stephen Crane

Many red devils ran from my heart
And out upon the page.
They were so tiny
The pen could mash them.
And many struggled in the ink.
It was strange
To write in this red muck
Of things from my heart.

(dedications) - adrienne rich

(Dedications)
by Adrienne Rich

I know you are reading this poem
late, before leaving your office
of the one intense yellow lamp-spot and the darkening window
in the lassitude of a building faded to quiet
long after rush-hour. I know you are reading this poem
standing up in a bookstore far from the ocean
on a grey day of early spring, faint flakes driven
across the plains' enormous spaces around you.
I know you are reading this poem
in a room where too much has happened for you to bear
where the bedclothes lie in a stagnant coils on the bed
and the open valise speaks of flight
but you cannot leave yet. I know you are reading this poem
as the underground train loses momentum and before running
up the stairs
toward a new kind of love
your life has never allowed.
I know you are reading this poem by the light
of the television screen where soundless images jerk and slide
while you wait for the newscast from the intifada.
i know you are reading this poem in a waiting-room
of eyes met and unmeeting, of identity with strangers.
I know you are reading this poem through your failing sight, the thick
lens enlarging these letters beyond all meaning yet you read on
because even the alphabet is precious.
I know you are reading this poem as you pace beside the stove
warming milk, a crying child on your shoulder, a book in your
hand
because life is short and you too are thirsty.
I know you are reading this poem which is not in your language
guessing at some words while others keep you reading
and I want to know which words they are.
I know you are reading this poem listening for something, torn
between bitterness and hope
turning back once again to the task you cannot refuse.
I know you are reading this poem because there is nothing else
left to read
there where you have landed, stripped as you are.

decisions - boris novak

Decisions
by Boris Novak (tr. Dintinjana)

Between two words
choose the quieter one.

Between word and silence
choose listening.

Between two books
choose the dustier one.

Between the earth and the sky
choose a bird.

Between two animals
choose the one who needs you more.

Between two children
choose both.

Between the lesser and the bigger evil
choose neither.

Between hope and despair
choose hope:
it will be harder to bear.

from "grapefruit" by yoko ono

from "Grapefruit"
by Yoko Ono

ANNOUNCEMENT PIECE I

Give death announcements each time you
move instead of giving announcements of
the change of address.
Send the same when you die.

1962 summer



ANNOUNCEMENT PIECE II

Give a moving announcement each time
you die.

1963 summer

"of all your forgotten ones..." - lea goldberg

"Of all your forgotten ones..."
by Lea Goldberg (tr. Back)

Of all your forgotten ones I
am the most forgotten.
Of all the faces
you have seen in the mirror
my face
is the most transparent.
And my voice
is lower than a cut field. And my name
is engraved on a heavy stone
at the bottom of a well.

not waving but drowning - stevie smith

Not Waving But Drowning
by Stevie Smith

Nobody heard him, the dead man,
But still he lay moaning:
I was much further out than you thought
And not waving but drowning.

Poor chap, he always loved larking
And now he's dead
It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,
They said.

Oh, no no no, it was too cold always
(Still the dead one lay moaning)
I was much too far out all my life
And no waving but drowning.

child - sylvia plath

Child
by Sylvia Plath

Your clear eye is the one absolutely beautiful thing.
I want to fill it with color and ducks,
The zoo of the new

Whose names you meditate ---
April snowdrop, Indian pipe,
Little

Stalk without wrinkle,
Pool in which images
Should be grand and classical

Not this troublous
Wringing of hands, this dark
Ceiling without a star.

vocation - sandra beasley

Vocation
by Sandra Beasley

For six months I dealt Baccarat in a casino.
For six months I played Brahms in a mall.
For six months I arranged museum dioramas;
my hands were too small for the Paleolithic
and when they reassigned me to lichens, I quit.
I type ninety-one words per minute, all of them
Help. Yes, I speak Dewey Decimal.
I speak Russian, Latin, a smattering of Tlingit.
I can balance seven dinner plates on my arm.
All I want to do is sit on a veranda while
a hard rain falls around me. I'll file your 1099s.
I'll make love to strangers of your choice.
I'll do whatever you want, as long as I can do it
on that veranda. If it calls you, it's your calling,
right? Once I asked a broker what he loved
about his job, and he said Making a killing.
Once I asked a serial killer what made him
get up in the morning, and he said The people.

the juggler at heaven's gate - raymond carver

The Juggler at Heaven's Gate
by Raymond Carver

Behind the dirty table where Kristofferson is having
breakfast, there's  a window that looks onto a nineteenth-
century street in Sweetwater, Wyoming. A juggler
is at work out there, wearing a top hat and a frock coat,
a little reed of a fellow keeping three sticks
in the air. Think about this for a minute.
This juggler. This amazing act of the mind and hands.
A man who juggles for a living.
Everyone in his time has known a star,
or a gunfighter. Somebody, anyway, who pushes somebody
around. But a juggler! Blue smoke hangs inside
this awful café, and over that dirty table where two
grownup men talk about a woman's future. And something,
something about the Cattlemen's Association.
But the eye keeps going back to that juggler.
That tiny spectacle. At this minute, Ella's plight
or the fate of the emigrants
is not nearly so important as this juggler's exploits.
How'd he get into the act, anyway? What's his story?
That's the story I want to know. Anybody
can wear a gun and swagger around. Or fall in love
with somebody who loves somebody else. But to juggle
for God's sake! To give your life to that.
To go with that. Juggling.

as the mist leaves no scar - leonard cohen

As The Mist Leaves No Scar
by Leonard Cohen

As the mist leaves no scar
On the dark green hill,
So my body leaves no scar
On you, nor ever will.

When wind and hawk encounter,
What remains to keep?
So you and I encounter,
Then turn, then fall to sleep.

As many nights endure
Without a moon or star,
So will we endure
When one is gone and far.

postscriptum - joseph brodsky

Postscriptum
by Joseph Brodsky (tr. George Kline)

How sad that my life has not come to mean
for you what your life came to mean for me.
...How many times in vacant lots have I
consigned my copper coin, crowned with the seal
of state, to that webbed universe of wires,
attempting hopelessly to stretch the time
of our connectedness...Alas, unless
a man can manage to eclipse the world,
he's left to twirl a gap-toothed dial in some
phone booth, as one might spin a ouija board,
until a phantom answers, echoing
the last wails of a buzzer in the night.

breakfast - jacques prévert

Breakfast
by Jacques Prévert (tr. Lawrence Ferlinghetti)


He put the coffee
In the cup
He put the milk
In the cup of coffee
He put the sugar
In the café au lait
With the coffee spoon
He stirred
He drank the café au lait
And he set down the cup
Without a word to me
He lit
A cigarette
He made smoke-rings
With the smoke
He put the ashes
In the ash-tray
Without a word to me
Without a look at me
He got up
He put
His hat upon his head
He put his raincoat on
Because it was raining
And he left
In the rain
Without a word
Without a look at me
And I  I took
My head in my hand
And I cried.

despair is seated on a bench - jacques prévert

Despair Is Seated On A Bench
by Jacques Prévert (tr. Lawrence Ferlinghetti)

In a square on a bench
There's a man who calls you when you pass
He has eyeglasses and old grey clothes
He smokes a little cigarillo
He is seated
And he calls you when you pass
Or simply makes you a sign
Don't look at him
Don't listen to him
Pass by
Make as if you didn't see him
As if you didn't hear him
Pass by hurry past
If you look at him
If you listen to him
He makes you a sign and nothing nobody
Can stop you from going to sit near him
So then he looks at you and smiles
And you suffer atrociously
And the man continues to smile
And you smile the same smile
Exactly
The more you smile the more you suffer
Atrociously
The more you suffer the more you smile
Irremediably
And you stay there
Seated fixed
Smiling on the bench
Children play near you
Passersby pass
Tranquilly
Birds fly off
Leaving one tree for another
And you stay there
On the bench
And you know you know
You never again will play
Like these children
You know you never again will pass
Tranquilly
Like these passersby
Never again fly
Leaving one tree for another
Likes these birds.

one night i burned - leonard cohen

One Night I Burned
by Leonard Cohen

One night I burned the house I loved,
It lit a perfect ring
In which I saw some weeds and stone
Beyond -- not anything.

Certain creatures of the air
Frightened by the night,
They came to see the world again
And perished in the light.

Now I sail from sky to sky
And all the blackness sings
Against the boat that I have made
Of mutilated wings.

love is a fire - leonard cohen

Love Is A Fire
by Leonard Cohen

Love is a fire
It burns everyone
It disfigures everyone
It is the world's excuse
for being ugly

waking dreams 6 - niloufar talebi

Waking Dreams 6
by Mina Assadi (tr. Niloufar Talebi)

After rain
          there will be rain
After loneliness
          loneliness
After you
          a silence
                    that shall give new meaning to loneliness
After night
          there will be night
After nightmares
          nightmares
After you
          a silence
                    that shall give new meanings to nightmares.

to fate - charles simic

To Fate
by Charles Simic

You were always more real to me than God.
Setting up the props for a tragedy,
Hammering the nails in
With only a few close friends invited to watch.

Just to be neighborly, you made a pretty girl lame,
Ran over a child with a motorcycle.
I can think of a million similar examples.
Ditto: How the two of us keep meeting.

A fortune-telling gumball machine in Chinatown
May have the answer,
An old creaky door opening in a horror film,
A pack of cards I left on a beach.

I can feel you snuggle close to me at night,
With your hot breath, your cold hands--
And me already like an old piano
Dangling out of a window at the end of a rope.

kazoo wedding - charles simic

Kazoo Wedding
by Charles Simic

The groom is red-cheeked as he blows into a kazoo
And so is the bride as she blows one too.
The guests are blowing hundreds of kazoos
And the Minister as he prepares to bless their union.
The weeping bridesmaid covers her ears.
One sounds like a bad muffler on a hearse,
Another like a wedding dress ripped open at midnight.
Look, even our Lord on the cross is tooting a kazoo!
What are they playing? the hard of hearing are asking.
It's a wedding march, Grandpa, the ushers shout.

department of complaints - charles simic

Department Of Complaints
by Charles Simic

Where you are destined to turn up
Some dark winter day
Walking up and down dead escalators
Searching for someone to ask
In this dusty old store
Soon to close its doors forever.

At long last, finding the place, the desk
Stacked high with sales slips,
Concealing the face of the one
You came to complain to
About the coat on your back,
Its frayed collar, the holes in its pockets.

Recalling the stately fitting room,
The obsequious salesman, the grim tailor
Who stuck pins in your shoulders
And made chalk marks on your sleeves
As you admired yourself in a mirror,
Your fists clenched fiercely at your side.

he would not stay for me, and who can wonder? - a.e. houseman

He would not stay for me, and who can wonder?
by A.E. Housman

He would not stay for me, and who can wonder?
He would not stay for me to stand and gaze.
I shook his hand, and tore my heart in sunder,
And went with half my life about my ways.

consolation - wislawa szymborska

Consolation
by Wislawa Szymborska

Darwin.
They say he read novels to relax,
But only certain kinds:
nothing that ended unhappily.
If anything like that turned up,
enraged, he flung the book into the fire.

True or not,
I’m ready to believe it.

Scanning in his mind so many times and places,
he’d had enough of dying species,
the triumphs of the strong over the weak,
the endless struggles to survive,
all doomed sooner or later.
He’d earned the right to happy endings,
at least in fiction
with its diminutions.

Hence the indispensable
silver lining,
the lovers reunited, the families reconciled,
the doubts dispelled, fidelity rewarded,
fortunes regained, treasures uncovered,
stiff-necked neighbors mending their ways,
good names restored, greed daunted,
old maids married off to worthy parsons,
troublemakers banished to other hemispheres,
forgers of documents tossed down the stairs,
seducers scurrying to the altar,
orphans sheltered, widows comforted,
pride humbled, wounds healed over,
prodigal sons summoned home,
cups of sorrow thrown into the ocean,
hankies drenched with tears of reconciliation,
general merriment and celebration,
and the dog Fido,
gone astray in the first chapter,
turns up barking gladly
in the last.

the problem - richard siken

The Problem
by Richard Siken

The problem (if there was one) was simply a problem with the question. He wants to paint a bird, needs to, and the problem is why. Why paint a bird? Why do anything at all? Not how, because hows are easy, series or sequence, one foot after the other, but existentially why bother, what does it solve? Be the tree, solve for bird. What does that mean? It’s a problem of focus, it’s a problem of diligence, it’s supposed to be a grackle but it sort of got away from him. But why not let the colors do what they want, which is blend, which is kind of neighborly, if you think about it. Blackbird, he says. So be it. Indexed and normative. Who gets to measure the distance between experience and its representation? Who controls the lines of inquiry? He does, but he’s not very good at it. And just because you want to paint a bird, do actually paint a bird, it doesn’t mean you’ve accomplished anything. Maybe if it was pretty, it would mean something. Maybe if it was beautiful it would be true. But it’s not, not beautiful, not true, not even realistic, more like a man in a birdsuit, blue shoulders instead of feathers, because he isn’t looking at a bird, real bird, as he paints, he is looking at his heart, which is impossible, unless his heart is a metaphor for his heart, as everything is a metaphor for itself, so that looking at the page is like looking out the window at a bird in your chest with a song in its throat that you don’t want to hear but you paint anyway because the hand is a voice that can sing what the voice will not and the hand wants to do something useful. Sometimes, at night, in bed, before I fall asleep, I think about a poem I might write, someday, about my heart, says the heart. Answer: be the heart. Answer: be the hand. Answer: be the bird. Answer: be the sky.

if i could tell you - w.h. auden

If I Could Tell You
by W.H. Auden

Time will say nothing but I told you so,
Time only knows the price we have to pay;
If I could tell you I would let you know.

If we should weep when clowns put on their show,
If we should stumble when musicians play,
Time will say nothing but I told you so.

There are no fortunes to be told, although,
Because I love you more than I can say,
If I could tell you I would let you know.

The winds must come from somewhere when they blow,
There must be reasons why the leaves decay;
Time will say nothing but I told you so.

Perhaps the roses really want to grow,
The vision seriously intends to stay;
If I could tell you I would let you know.

Suppose all the lions get up and go,
And all the brooks and soldiers run away;
Will Time say nothing but I told you so?
If I could tell you I would let you know.

an unacceptable smile - kostas montis

An Unacceptable Smile
by Kostas Montis (tr. Amaranth Sitas & Charles Dodd)

I do not know how far the rights of a mirror reach,
I do not know if a mirror
has the right to break the rules
and examine the essence,
but in any case that mirror was interfering
and would not relay the smile;
it would not reflect.

casabianca - elizabeth bishop

Casabianca
by Elizabeth Bishop

 Love's the boy stood on the burning deck
 trying to recite "The boy stood on
 the burning deck". Love's the son
        stood stammering elocution
        while the poor ship in flames went down.

 Love's the obstinate boy, the ship,
 even the swimming sailors, who
 would like a schoolroom platform, too
        or an excuse to stay
        on deck. And love's the burning boy.

kites - kostas montis

Kites
by Kostas Montis (tr. Amaranth Sitas & Charles Dodd)

We are kites,
kites caught on the electric wires,
with those broken strings,
with that torn paper,
with that abandonment to the wind,
with that abandonment to mockery,
with that abandonment to the end.

those who love - sara teasdale

Those Who Love
by Sara Teasdale

Those who love the most,
Do not talk of their love,
Francesca, Guinevere,
Deirdre, Iseult, Heloise,
In the fragrant gardens of heaven
Are silent, or speak if at all
Of fragile, inconsequent things.

And a woman I used to know
Who loved one man from her youth,
Against the strength of the fates
Fighting in somber pride,
Never spoke of this thing,
But hearing his name by chance,
A light would pass over her face.

the eyes of the poor - charles baudelaire

The Eyes Of The Poor
by Charles Baudelaire

Ah! So you would like to know why I hate you today? It will certainly be harder for you to understand than for me to explain, for you are, I believe, the most perfect example of feminine impermeability that exists.

We had spent a long day together which to me had seemed short. We had duly promised each other that all our thoughts should be shared in common, and that our two souls henceforth be but one -- a dream which, after all, has nothing original about it except that, although dreamed by every man on earth, it has been realized by none.

That evening, a little tired, you wanted to sit down in front of a new cafe forming the corner of a new boulevard still littered with rubbish but that already displayed proudly its unfinished splendors. The cafe was dazzling. Even the gas burned with all the ardor of a debut, and lighted with all its might the blinding whiteness of the walls, the expanse of mirrors, the gold cornices and moldings, fat-cheeked pages dragged along by hounds on leash, laughing ladies with falcons on their writs, nymphs and goddesses bearing on their heads piles of fruits, pates and game, Hebes and Ganymedes holding out little amphoras of syrups or party-colored ices; all history and all mythology pandering to gluttony.

On the street directly in front of us, a worthy man of about forty, with tired face and greying beard, was standing holding a small boy by the hand and carrying on his arm another little thing, still too weak to walk. He was playing nurse-maid, taking the children for an evening stroll. They were in rags. The three faces were extraordinarily serious, and those six eyes stared fixedly at the new cafe with admiration, equal in degree but differing in kind according to their ages.

The eyes of the father said: "How beautiful it is! How beautiful it is! All the gold of the poor world must have found its way onto those walls." The eyes of the little boy: "How beautiful it is! How beautiful it is! But it is a house where only people who are not like us can go." As for the baby, he was much too fascinated to express anything but joy -- utterly stupid and profound.

Song writers say that pleasure ennobles the soul and softens the heart. The song was right that evening as far as I was concerned. Not only was I touched by this family of eyes but I was even a little ashamed of our glasses and decanters, too big for our thirst. I turned my eyes to look into yours, dear love, to read my thoughts in them; and as I plunged my eyes into your eyes, so beautiful and curiously soft, into those green eyes, home of Caprice and governed by the Moon, you said: "Those people are insufferable with their great saucer eyes. Can't you tell the proprietor to send them away?"

So you see how difficult it is to understand one another, my dear angel, how incommunicable thought is, even between two people in love.



Les yeux des pauvres
by Charles Baudelaire

Ah! vous voulez savoir pourquoi je vous hais aujourd'hui. Il vous sera sans doute moins facile de le comprendre qu'a moi de vous l'expliquer; car vous etes, je crois, le plus bel exemple d'imperméabilité féminine qui se puisse rencontrer.
Nous avions passé ensemble une longue journée qui m'avait paru courte. Nous nous étions bien promis que toutes nos pensées nous seraient communes a l'un et a l'autre, et que nos deux âmes désormais n'en feraient plus qu'une; - un reve qui n'a rien d'original, apres tout, si ce n'est que, revé par tous les hommes, il n'a été réalisé par aucun.
Le soir, un peu fatiguée, vous voulutes vous asseoir devant un café neuf qui formait le coin d'un boulevard neuf, encore tout plein de gravois et montrant déja glorieusement ses splendeurs inachevées
Le café étincelait. Le gaz lui-meme y déployait toute l'ardeur d'un début, et éclairait de toutes ses forces les murs aveuglants de blancheur, les nappes éblouissantes des miroirs, les ors des baguettes et des corniches, les pages aux joues rebondies tramés par les chiens en laisse, les dames riant au faucon perché sur leur poing, les nymphes et les déesses portant sur leur tete des fruits, des pâtés et du gibier, les Hébés et les Ganymedes présentant a bras tendu la petite amphore a bavaroises ou l'obélisque bicolore des glaces panachées; toute l'histoire et toute la mythologie mises au service de la goinfrerie
Droit devant nous, sur la chaussée, était planté un brave homme d'une quarantaine d'années, au visage fatigué, a la barbe grisonnante, tenant d'une main un petit garçon et portant sur l'autre bras un petit etre trop faible pour marcher. Il remplissait l'office de bonne et faisait prendre a ses enfants l'air du soir.
Tous en guenilles. Ces trois visages étaient extraordinairement sérieux, et ces six yeux contemplaient fixement le café nouveau avec une admiration égale, mais nuancée diversement par l'âge.
Les yeux du pere disaient: "Que c'est beau! que c'est beau! on dirait que tout l'or du pauvre monde est venu se porter sur ces murs." - Les yeux du petit garçon: "Que c'est beau! que c'est beau! mais c'est une maison ou peuvent seuls entrer les gens qui ne sont pas comme nous." - Quant aux yeux du plus petit, ils étaient trop fascinés pour exprimer autre chose qu'une joie stupide et profonde.
Les chansonniers disent que le plaisir rend l'âme bonne et amollit le coeur. La chanson avait raison ce soir-la, relativement a moi. Non-seulement j'étais attendri par cette famille d'yeux, mais je me sentais un peu honteux de nos verres et de nos carafes, plus grands que notre soif. Je tournais mes regards vers les vôtres, cher amour, pour y lire ma pensée; je plongeais dans vos yeux si beaux et si bizarrement doux, dans vos yeux verts, habités par le Caprice et inspirés par la Lune, quand vous me dites: "Ces gens-la me sont insupportables avec leurs yeux ouverts comme des portes cocheres! Ne pourriez-vous pas prier le maître du café de les éloigner d'ici?"

Tant il est difficile de s'entendre, mon cher ange, et tant la pensée est incommunicable, meme entre gens qui s'aiment!



How Beautiful You Are
by The Cure

You want to know why I hate you?
 Well I'll try and explain

 You remember that day in Paris
 When we wandered through the rain
 And promised to each other
 That we'd always think the same
 And dreamed that dream
 To be two souls as one

 And stopped just as the sun set
 And waited for the night
 Outside a glittering building
 Of glittering glass and burning light

 And in the road before us
 Stood a weary grayish man
 Who held a child upon his back
 A small boy by the hand
 The three of them were dressed in rags
 And thinner than air
 And all six eyes stared fixedly on you

 The father's eyes said "Beautiful!
 How beautiful you are!"
 The boy's eyes said
 "How beautiful!
 She shimmers like a star!"
 The child's eyes uttered nothing
 But a mute and utter joy
 And filled my heart with shame for us
 At the way we are

 I turned to look at you
 To read my thought upon your face
 And gazed so deep into your eyes
 So beautiful and strange
 Until you spoke
 And showed me understanding is a dream
 "I hate these people staring
 Make them go away from me!"

 And this is why I hate you
 And how I understand
 That no-one ever knows or loves another
 Or loves another

fundamental difference - yannis ritsos

Fundamental Difference
by Yannis Ritsos (tr. Minas Savvas)

In the middle of the road they got hungry.  They sat down
     for their lunch,
there, near the grass.  A feather
from a passing bird fell on their bread.  One of them
saw it and was astonished.  He stopped.  The other
continued to eat voraciously.  There they separated.

that which remains - adriana ierodiakonou

That Which Remains
by Adriana Ierodiakonou (tr. Thanasis Maskaleris)

That which remains most
is what leaves us
     As the nothing is much
     And the little is nothing

And cylinders grind the moment
Into the finest of leaves

i'm nobody - emily dickinson

"I'm Nobody!..." (288)
by Emily Dickinson

I'm Nobody!  Who are you?
Are you--Nobody--Too?
Then there's a pair of us?
Don't tell!  They'd advertise--you know!

How dreary--to be--Somebody!
How public--like a Frog--
To tell one's name--the livelong June--
To an admiring Bog!

the obligation to be happy - linda pastan

The Obligation to Be Happy
by Linda Pastan

It is more onerous
than the rites of beauty
or housework, harder than love.
But you expect it of me casually,
the way you expect the sun
to come up, not in spite of rain
or clouds but because of them.

And so I smile, as if my own fidelity
to sadness were a hidden vice—
that downward tug on my mouth,
my old suspicion that health
and love are brief irrelevancies,
no more than laughter in the warm dark
strangled at dawn.

Happiness. I try to hoist it
on my narrow shoulders again—
a knapsack heavy with gold coins.
I stumble around the house,
bump into things.
Only Midas himself
would understand.

parable of the russian émigrés - zbigniew herbert

Parable Of The Russian Émigrés 
by Zbigniew Herbert (tr. Peter Dale Scott)

It was the year twenty
or perhaps twenty-one
the Russian émigrés
came to us

tall blond people
with visionary eyes
and women like a dream

when they crossed the market-place
we used to say - migratory birds

they used to attend the soirées of the gentry
everyone would whisper - look what pearls

but when the lights of the ball were extinguished
helpless people remained

the grey newspapers were continuously silent
only solitaire showed pity

the guitars beyond the windows would cease playing
and even dark eyes faded

in the evening a samovar with a whistle
would carry them back to their family railway-stations

after a couple of years
only three of them were spoken about
the one who went mad
the one who hanged himself
she to whom men used to come

the rest lived out of the way
slowly turning into dust

   This parable is told by Nicholas
   who understands historical necessities
   in order to terrify me i.e. to convince me

late fragment - christian wiman

Late Fragment
by Christian Wiman

How to say this--
my silences were not always mine:
scrabbled hole and the dark beyond,
vaporous pond
as if water wanted out of itself,
tip of the sycamore's weird bare reach:
some latency in things leading not so much to speech
as to a halting, haunted art
wherein to master was to miss--
how to say this, how to say this  . . .

My father was a boatbuilder.
Prow of a man, his world a sea to cleave.
I learned a dangerous patience,
to navigate night, live on nothing, leave.
And my mother, her furious smallness,
her way of saying her blade, the oil and onion's hiss:
from her I learned what lies beneath.

Mystic, Istanbul, Jakarta, Dar es Salaam--
what was I meant to keep?
If the distances to which I've been given
suggest some wantless heaven
of the mind, what in me still traces
the creekbed creases
in the rough skin of the palm
of one so long, long asleep?

If I say I loved the seagull
tethered to its cry, the cypress's imprisoned winds,
speak to the brink of my hands
a moss-covered rock
soft and knobby as a kitten's skull.
If I say I loved.

Boston, Lisbon, Cardiff, Asuncion:
what name is not a horizon?
Somewhere it is evening,
light grown mild and pliable,
wielded by wave and rock,
in the shore's trees torn apart . . .

desert places - robert frost

Desert Places
by Robert Frost

Snow falling and night falling fast, oh, fast
In a field I looked into going past,
And the ground almost covered smooth in snow,
But a few weeds and stubble showing last.

The woods around it have it--it is theirs.
All animals are smothered in their lairs.
I am too absent-spirited to count;
The loneliness includes me unawares.

And lonely as it is, that loneliness
Will be more lonely ere it will be less--
A blanker whiteness of benighted snow
With no expression, nothing to express.

They cannot scare me with their empty spaces
Between stars--on stars where no human race is.
I have it in me so much nearer home
To scare myself with my own desert places.

food for prophets - gunter grass

Food For Prophets
by Gunter Grass (tr. Anselm Hollo)

When the locusts occupied our town,
no milk came to the door, the dailies suffocated,
our jails were opened to release
all prophets.
They streamed through the streets,
3800 prophets,
talking and teaching without restriction,
and eating their fill of that grey
& jumpy mess
we called the plague.
So everything was fine and up to expectations.

Soon our milk came again; our papers reappeared;
and prophets filled our jails.

winter: my secret - christina rossetti

Winter: My Secret
by Christina Rossetti

I tell my secret? No indeed, not I:
Perhaps some day, who knows?
But not today; it froze, and blows and snows,
And you're too curious: fie!
You want to hear it? well:
Only, my secret's mine, and I won't tell.

Or, after all, perhaps there's none:
Suppose there is no secret after all,
But only just my fun.
Today's a nipping day, a biting day;
In which one wants a shawl,
A veil, a cloak, and other wraps:
I cannot ope to everyone who taps,
And let the draughts come whistling thro' my hall;
Come bounding and surrounding me,
Come buffeting, astounding me,
Nipping and clipping thro' my wraps and all.
I wear my mask for warmth: who ever shows
His nose to Russian snows
To be pecked at by every wind that blows?
You would not peck? I thank you for good will,
Believe, but leave the truth untested still.

Spring's an expansive time: yet I don't trust
March with its peck of dust,
Nor April with its rainbow-crowned brief showers,
Nor even May, whose flowers
One frost may wither thro' the sunless hours.

Perhaps some languid summer day,
When drowsy birds sing less and less,
And golden fruit is ripening to excess,
If there's not too much sun nor too much cloud,
And the warm wind is neither still nor loud,
Perhaps my secret I may say,
Or you may guess.

queen victoria and me - leonard cohen

Queen Victoria And Me
by Leonard Cohen

Queen Victoria
my father and all his tobacco loved you
I love you too in all your forms
the slim unlovely virgin anyone would lay
the white figure floating among German beards
the mean governess of the huge pink maps
the solitary mourner of a prince
Queen Victoria
I am cold and rainy
I am dirty as a glass roof in a train station
I feel like an empty cast-iron exhibition
I want ornaments on everything
because my love she gone with other boys
Queen Victoria
do you have a punishment under the white lace
will you be short with her
and make her read little Bibles
will you spank her with a mechanical corset
I want her pure as power
I want her skin slightly musty with petticoats
will you wash the easy bidets out of her head
Queen Victoria
I'm not much nourished by modern love
Will you come into my life
with your sorrow and your black carriages
and your perfect memory
Queen Victoria
The 20th century belongs to you and me
Let us be two severe giants
(not less lonely for our partnership)
who discolour test tubes in the halls of science
who turn up unwelcome at every World's Fair
heavy with proverb and correction
confusing the star-dazed tourists
with our incomparable sense of loss

a waking - octavio paz

A Waking
by Octavio Paz (tr. Eliot Weinberger)

I was walled inside a dream.
Its walls had no consistency,
no weight: its emptiness was its weight.
The walls were hours and the hours
sorrow, hoarded forever.
The time of those hours was not time.

I leapt through a breach: in this world
it was four o'clock. The room was my room
and my ghost was in each thing.
I wasn't there. I looked out the window:
not a soul under the electric light.
Vigilant streetlamps, dirty snow,
houses and cars asleep, the insomnia
of a lamp, the oak that talks to itself,
the wind and its knives, the illegible
writing of the constellations.

The things were buried deep in themselves
and my eyes of flesh saw them
weary of being, realities
stripped of their names. My two eyes
were souls grieving for the world.
On the empty street the presence
passed without passing, vanishing
into its forms, fixed in its changes,
and turned now into houses, oaks, snow, time.
Life and death flowed on, blurred together.

Uninhabited sight, the presence
looked at me with nobody's eyes:
a bundle of reflections over the cliffs.
I looked inside: the room was my room
and I wasn't there. Being lacks nothing
-- always full of itself, always the same --
even though we are not there...Outside,
the clarities, still uncertain:
dawn in the jumble of the rooftops.
The constellations were being erased.

the flowers that i left in the ground - leonard cohen

The Flowers That I Left In The Ground
by Leonard Cohen

The flowers that I left in the ground,
that I did not gather for you,
today I bring them all back,
to let them grow forever,
not in poems or marble,
but where they fell and rotted.

And the ships in their great stalls,
huge and transitory as heroes,
ships I could not captain,
today I bring them back
to let them sail forever,
not in model or ballad,
but where they were wrecked and scuttled.

And the child on whose shoulders I stand,
whose longing I purged
with public, kingly discipline,
today I bring him back
to languish forever,
not in confession or biography,
but where he flourished,
growing sly and hairy.

It is not malice that draws me away,
draws me to renunciation, betrayal:
it is weariness, I go for weariness of thee.
Gold, ivory, flesh, love, G-d, blood, moon --
I have become the expert of the catalogue.

My body once so familiar with glory,
my body has become a museum:
this part remembered because of someone's mouth,
this because of a hand,
this of wetness, this of heat.

Who owns anything he has not made?
With your beauty I am as uninvolved
as with horses' manes and waterfalls.
This is my last catalogue.
I breathe the breathless
I love you, I love you --
and let you move forever.

possibilities - henry wadsworth longfellow

Possibilities
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Where are the Poets, unto whom belong
The Olympian heights; whose singing shafts were sent
Straight to the mark, and not from bows half bent,
But with the utmost tension of the thong?
Where are the stately argosies of song,
Whose rushing keels made music as they went
Sailing in search of some new continent,
With all sail set, and steady winds and strong?
Perhaps there lives some dreamy boy, un­taught
In schools, some graduate of the field or street,
Who shall become a master of the art,
An admiral sailing the high seas of thought,
Fearless and first, and steering with his fleet
For lands not yet laid down in any chart.

"the brain within its groove..." - emily dickinson

"The brain within its groove.." 
by Emily Dickinson

The brain within its groove
Runs evenly and true;
But let a splinter swerve,
'T were easier for you
To put the water back
When floods have slit the hills,
And scooped a turnpike for themselves,
And blotted out the mills!

the solitary reaper - william wordsworth

The Solitary Reaper
by William Wordsworth

Behold her, single in the field,
Yon solitary Highland Lass!
Reaping and singing by herself;
Stop here, or gently pass!
Alone she cuts and binds the grain,
And sings a melancholy strain;
O listen! for the Vale profound
Is overflowing with the sound.

No Nightingale did ever chaunt
More welcome notes to weary bands
Of travellers in some shady haunt,
Among Arabian sands:
A voice so thrilling ne'er was heard
In spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird,
Breaking the silence of the seas
Among the farthest Hebrides.

Will no one tell me what she sings?--
Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow
For old, unhappy, far-off things,
And battles long ago:
Or is it some more humble lay,
Familiar matter of to-day?
Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain,
That has been, and may be again?

Whate'er the theme, the Maiden sang
As if her song could have no ending;
I saw her singing at her work,
And o'er the sickle bending;--
I listened, motionless and still;
And, as I mounted up the hill
The music in my heart I bore,
Long after it was heard no more.

this is a photograph of me - margaret atwood

This Is a Photograph of Me
by Margaret Atwood

It was taken some time ago.
At first it seems to be
a smeared
print: blurred lines and grey flecks
blended with the paper;

then, as you scan
it, you see in the left-hand corner
a thing that is like a branch: part of a tree
(balsam or spruce) emerging
and, to the right, halfway up
what ought to be a gentle
slope, a small frame house.

In the background there is a lake,
and beyond that, some low hills.

(The photograph was taken
the day after I drowned.

I am in the lake, in the center
of the picture, just under the surface.

It is difficult to say where
precisely, or to say
how large or small I am:
the effect of water
on light is a distortion

but if you look long enough,
eventually
you will be able to see me.)

wrestling with the angel - jacques prévert

Wrestling With The Angel
by Jacques Prévert (tr. Benedikt)

Don't bother
The fight's fixed
The match is rigged
and when he or she or it appears aloft above the ring
surrounded by spotlights
they'll all start singing Te Deum
and even before you have the chance to get up from your little
chair in the corner
their gong will sound
they'll throw their sacred sponge in your eyes
And you won't even get in a quick jab to the feathers
before they all grab you
and he or she or it will hit you below the belt
and you'll fall flat
arms stuck out stiff in an idiotic cross
outstretched in the sawdust
and you may never again be able to make love.


Le Combat avec l'Ange
par Jacques Prévert

N’y va pas
tout est combiné d’avance
le match est truqué
et quand il apparaîtra sur le ring
environné d’éclairs de magnésium
ils entonneront à tue-tête le Te Deum
et avant même que tu te sois levé de ta chaise
ils te sonneront les cloches à toute volée
ils te jetteront à la figure l’éponge sacrée
et tu n’auras pas le temps de lui voler dans les plumes
ils se jetteront sur toi
et il te frappera au-dessous de la ceinture
et tu t’écrouleras
les bras stupidement en croix
dans la sciure
et jamais plus tu ne pourras faire l’amour.

a forge, and a scythe - raymond carver

A Forge, and a Scythe
by Raymond Carver

One minute I had the windows open
and the sun was out. Warm breezes
blew through the room.
(I remarked on this in a letter.)
Then, while I watched, it grew dark.
The water began whitecapping.
All the sport-fishing boats turned
and headed in, a little fleet.
Those wind-chimes on the porch
blew down. The tops of our trees shook.
The stove pipe squeaked and rattled
around in its moorings.
I said, "A forge, and a scythe."
I talk to myself like this.
Saying the names of things --
capstan, hawser, loam, leaf, furnace.
Your face, your mouth, your shoulder
inconceivable to me now!
Where did they go? It's like
I dreamed them.  The stones we brought
home from the beach lie face up
on the windowsill, cooling.
Come home. Do you hear?
My lungs are thick with the smoke
of your absence.  

feeling fucked up - etheridge knight

Feeling Fucked Up
by Etheridge Knight

Lord she's gone done left me done packed/up and split
and I with no way to make her
come back and everywhere the world is bare
bright bone white     crystal sand glistens
dope death dead dying and jiving drove
her away made her take her laughter and her smiles
and her softness and her midnight sighs--

Fuck Coltrane and music and clouds drifting in the sky
fuck the sea and trees and the sky and birds
and alligators and all the animals that roam the earth
fuck marx and mao fuck fidel and nkrumah and
democracy and communism fuck smack and pot
and red ripe tomatoes fuck joseph fuck mary fuck
god jesus and all the disciples fuck fanon nixon
and malcolm fuck the revolution fuck freedom fuck
the whole muthafucking thing
all i want now is my woman back
so my soul can sing

in the lobby of the hotel del mayo - raymond carver

In The Lobby of the Hotel del Mayo
by Raymond Carver

The girl in the lobby reading a leather-bound book.
The man in the lobby using a broom.
The boy in the lobby watering plants.
The desk clerk looking at his nails.
The woman in the lobby writing a letter.
The old man in the lobby sleeping in his chair.
The fan in the lobby revolving slowly overhead.
Another hot Sunday afternoon.

Suddenly, the girl lays her finger between the pages of
   her book.
The man leans on his broom and looks.
The boy stops in his tracks.
The desk clerk raises his eyes and stares.
The woman quits writing.
The old man stirs and wakes up.
What is it?

Someone is running up from the harbor.
Someone who has the sun behind him.
Someone who is barechested.
Waving his arms.

It's clear something terrible has happened.
The man is running straight for the hotel.
His lips are working themselves into a scream.
Everyone in the lobby will recall their terror.
Everyone will remember this moment for the rest of their lives.

unanswered letter - tess gallagher

Unanswered Letter
by Tess Gallagher

Your silence is leaning toward judgment.
Yesterday I bragged, writing to calm
my paranoid friend, that I never assume
the worst when my pals don’t write. Now
assuming the worst, I think what I must have
done, or not done. Surely some recognition
will brand the door of my house, or
rich attention flutter down.

How natural, in silence, to credit delay
with intention, like the word oar
insisting on water. The need also to
advise the self around exaggeration,
i.e., “nobody loves me,” because nothing is
coming back, and, next to nothing, not
to act like a transistor radio left on into
the night, voices singing like an ear
baffled by the rain, or someone refused
because they think so.

Those others you loved elsewhere, you miss
what they haven’t said. They belong
to some permission to go on as more
than yourself, a clarity that adds you back
to all you cast off, as when
you want to be the good light of a lamp
scanning the firmament, or rain- its pleasure
with an open boat.

So what is unanswered keeps you coming back
to yourself, telling you what you wanted
only when it didn’t come, having now
to make up this difference.
Even moments you think empty, the world
doesn’t stop speaking – the windshield
blurred suddenly by a sighting of gravestones,
before you are driven
through the underpass.

love at first sight - wislawa szymborska

Love at First Sight
by Wislawa Szymborska (tr. Baranczak & Cavanagh)

They’re both convinced
that a sudden passion joined them.
Such certainty is beautiful
but uncertainty is more beautiful still.

Since they’d never met before, they’re sure
that there’d been nothing between them.
But what’s the word from the streets, staircases, hallways –
perhaps they’ve passed each other by a million times?

I want to ask them
if they don’t remember –
a moment face to face
in some revolving door?
perhaps a “sorry” muttered in a crowd?
a curt “wrong number” caught in the receiver? –
but I know the answer.
No, they don’t remember.

They’d be amazed to hear
that Chance has been toying with them
now for years.

Not quite ready yet
to become their Destiny,
it pushed them close, drove them apart,
it barred their path,
stifling a laugh,
and then leaped aside.

There were signs and signals
even if they couldn’t read them yet.
Perhaps three years ago
or just last Tuesday
a certain leaf fluttered
from one shoulder to another?
Something was dropped and then picked up.
Who knows, maybe the ball that vanished
into childhood’s thickets?

There were doorknobs and doorbells
where one touch had covered another
beforehand.
Suitcases checked and standing side by side.
One night perhaps some dream
grown hazy by morning.

Every beginning
is only a sequel, after all,
and the book of events
is always open halfway through.

the correspondence school instructor says goodbye to his poetry students - galway kinnell

The Correspondence School Instructor
Says Goodbye to His Poetry Students
by Galwlay Kinnell

Goodbye, lady in Bangor, who sent me
snapshots of yourself, after definitely hinting
you were beautiful; goodbye,
Miami Beach urologist, who enclosed plain
brown envelopes for the return of your very
"Clinical Sonnets", goodbye, manufacturer
of brassieres on the Coast, whose eclogues
give the fullest treatment in literature yet
to the sagging-breast motif; goodbye, you in San Quentin,
who wrote, "Being German my hero is Hitler,"
instead of "Sincerely yours," at the end of long,
neat-scripted letters demolishing
the pre-Raphaelites:

I swear to you, it was just my way
of cheering myself up, as I licked
the stamped, self-addressed envelopes,
the game I had
of trying to guess which one of you, this time,
had poisoned his glue.  I did care.
I did read each poem entire.
I did say what I thought was the truth
in the mildest words I knew.  And now,
in this poem, or chopped prose, not any better,
I realize, than those troubled lines
I kept sending back to you,
I have to say I am relieved it is over:
at the end I could only feel pity
for that urge toward more life
your poems kept smothering in words, the smell
of which, days later, would tingle
in your nostrils as new, God-given impulses
to write.

Goodbye,
you who are, for me, the postmarks again
of shattered towns--Xenia, Burnt Cabins, Hornell--
their loneliness
given away in poems, only their solitude kept.

solitude - rainer maria rilke

Solitude
by Rainer Maria Rilke (tr. Edward Snow)

Solitude is like a rain.
It rises from the sea toward evening;
from plains, which are distant and remote,
it goes to the sky, which always has it.
And only then it falls from the sky on the city.

It rains down in the in-between hours,
when all the crooked streets turn toward morning,
and when the bodies, which found nothing,
leave each other feeling sad and disappointed;
and when the people, who hate each other,
have to sleep together in one bed:

then solitude flows with the rivers . . .

it is the season - josephine jacobsen

It Is The Season
by Josephine Jacobsen

when we learn
or do not learn
to say goodbye.

The crone leaves that as green
virgins opened themselves
to sun, creak at our feet

and all farewells return
to crowd the air:
say, Chinese lovers by a bridge,

with crows, and a waterfall;
He will cross
the bridge, the crows fly;

children who told each other
secrets, and will not speak
next summer;

Some speech of parting
mentions God, as in
à Dieu, Adios,

commending what cannot
be kept
to permanence.

There is nothing of north
unknown, as the dark
comes earlier.  The birds

take their lives in their wings
for the cruel trip;
all farewells are rehearsals.

Darling, the sun rose
later today.
Summer, summer

is what we had.
Say nothing yet.
Prepare.

between going and staying - octavio paz

Between Going And Staying
by Octavio Paz

Between going and staying the day wavers,
in love with its own transparency.

The circular afternoon is now a bay
where the world in stillness rocks.

All is visible and all elusive,
all is near and can’t be touched.

Paper, book, pencil, glass,
rest in the shade of their names.

Time throbbing in my temples repeats
the same unchanging syllable of blood.

The light turns the indifferent wall
into a ghostly theater of reflections.

I find myself in the middle of an eye,
watching myself in its blank stare.

The moment scatters. Motionless,
I stay and go: I am a pause.

the burning of the books - bertolt brecht

The Burning of The Books
by Bertolt Brecht

When the Regime commanded that books with harmful knowledge
Should be publicly burned on all sides
Oxen were forced to drag cart loads of books
To the bonfires, a banished
Writer, one of the best, scanning the list of the
Burned, was shocked to find that his
Books had been passed over. He rushed to his desk
On wings of wrath, and wrote a letter to those in power.
Burn me! he wrote with flying pen, burn me. Haven’t my books
Always reported the truth? And here you are
Treating me like a liar! I command you:
Burn me!

the christmas star - gabriela mistral

The Christmas Star
by Gabriela Mistral (tr. Maria Giachetti)

A little girl
comes running,
she caught and carries a star.
She goes flying, making the plants
and animals she passes
bend with fire.

Her hands already sizzle,
she tires, wavers, stumbles,
and falls headlong,
but she gets right up with it again.

Her hands don't burn away,
nor does the star break apart,
although her face, arms,
chest and hair are on fire.

She burns down to her waist.
People shout at her
and she won't let it go;
her hands are parboiled,
but she won't release the star.

Oh how she sows its seeds
as it hums and flies.
They try to take it away--
but how can she live
without her star?

It didn't simply fall--it didn't.
It remained without her,
and now she runs without a body,
changed transformed into ashes.

The road catches fire
and our braids burn,
and now we all receive her
because the entire Earth is burning.

doria (dorian girl) - ezra pound

Doria (Dorian Girl)
by Ezra Pound

Be in me as the eternal moods
             of the bleak wind, and not
As transient things are--
       gaiety of flowers.
Have me in the strong loneliness
       of sunless cliffs
And of grey waters.
       Let the gods speak softly of us
In days hereafter,
       The shadowy flowers of Orcus
Remember thee.

it must have been the spirits - c.p. cavafy

It Must Have Been The Spirits 
by C.P. Cavafy (tr. Daniel Mendelsohn)

It must have been the spirits that I drank last night,
it must have been that I was drowsing, I'd been tired all day long.

The black wooden column vanished before me,
with the ancient head; and the dining-room door,
and the armchair, the red one; and the little settee.
In their place came a street in Marseille.
And freed now, unabashed, my soul
appeared there once again and moved about,
along with the form of a sensitive, pleasure-bent youth--
the dissolute youth:  that too must be said.

It must have been the spirits that I drank last night,
it mast have been that I was drowsing, I'd been tired all day long.

My soul was released; the poor thing, it's
always constrained by the weight of the years.

My soul was released and it showed me
a sympathique street in Marseille,
with the form of the happy, dissolute youth
who never felt ashamed, not he, certainly.

a fairly sad tale - dorothy parker

A Fairly Sad Tale
by Dorothy Parker

I think that I shall never know
Why I am thus, and I am so.
Around me, other girls inspire
In men the rush and roar of fire,
The sweet transparency of glass,
The tenderness of April grass,
The durability of granite;
But me- I don’t know how to plan it.
The lads I’ve met in Cupid’s deadlock
Were- shall we say?- born out of wedlock.
They broke my heart, they stilled my song,
And said they had to run along,
Explaining, so to sop my tears,
First came their parents or careers.
But ever does experience
Deny me wisdom, calm, and sense!
Though she’s a fool who seeks to capture
The twenty-first fine, careless rapture,
I must go on, till ends my rope,
Who from my birth was cursed with hope.
A heart in half is chaste, archaic;
But mine resembles a mosaic-
The thing’s become ridiculous!
Why am I so? Why am I thus?

to tu fu from shantung - li po

To Tu Fu From Shantung
by Li Po

You ask how I spend my time–
I nestle against a treetrunk
and listen to autumn winds
in the pines all night and day.

Shantung wine can’t get me drunk.
The local poets bore me.
My thoughts remain with you,
like the Wen River, endlessly flowing.

balance - adam zagajewski

Balance
by Adam Zagajewski (translated by Clare Cavanagh)

I watched the arctic landscape from above
and thought of nothing, lovely nothing.
I observed white canopies of clouds, vast
expanses where no wolf tracks could be found.

I thought about you and about the emptiness
that can promise one thing only: plenitude—
and that a certain sort of snowy wasteland
bursts from a surfeit of happiness.

As we drew closer to our landing,
the vulnerable earth emerged among the clouds,
comic gardens forgotten by their owners,
pale grass plagued by winter and the wind.

I put my book down and for an instant felt
a perfect balance between waking and dreams.
But when the plane touched concrete, then
assiduously circled the airport's labyrinth,

I once again knew nothing. The darkness
of daily wanderings resumed, the day’s sweet darkness,
the darkness of the voice that counts and measures,
remembers and forgets.

banking - cara benson

Banking

by Cara Benson

Sometimes I pick up the phone and there is a person

the person speaks.

Sometimes I have spoken first and I say things

like hello is someone there I am here.

I worry sometimes.  Sometimes I worry so much

I pick up the phone to call someone to tell them

about my worries.  Sometimes they try to talk me out of worrying

but sometimes this doesn't work so I hang up.

When I hang up after efforts to calm me fail I sometimes

call the person back to apologize and worry my apology will not be accepted.

When my apology is accepted I feel better

till I remember the initial worry but only sometimes

my apology is accepted because I have done this before.  Maybe more than once.

But when I speak and worry and do not apologize

other people sometimes worry about me.

I speak a lot and apologize less.

On the phone I sound confident sometimes.

I call out of state and leave messages.  I do

not leave a return number because I do

not want to speak with the person.

Sometimes the person can get my number anyway because of technology

but they usually do not call back because they are not worried about it.

These people I don't apologize to.  Not ever.

my strip club - denise duhamel

My Strip Club
by Denise Duhamel

In my strip club
the girls crawl on stage
wearing overalls
and turtlenecks
then slowly pull on
gloves, ski masks
and hiking boots.
As the music slows,
they lick the pole
and for a tantalizing second
their tongues stick
because it's so cold.
They zip up parkas
and tie tight bows
under their hoods.
A big spender
can take one of my girls
into a back room
where he can clamp
her snowshoes.

unexpected dangers - louise erdrich

Unexpected Dangers
by Louise Erdrich

I'm much the worse for wear, it's double true.
Too many incidents
a man might misconstrue--
my conduct, for a lack of innocence.

I seem to get them crazed or lacking sense
in the first place.
Ancient, solid gents
I sit by on the bus because they're safe,

get me going, coming, with their canes,
or what is worse
the spreading stains
across the seat.  I recognize at once

just what they're up to, rustling in their coats.
There was a priest,
the calmer sort,
his cassock flowing  down from neck to feet.

We got to talking and I brushed his knee
by accident,
and dutifully,
he took my hand and put it back

not quite where it belonged; his judgement
was not that exact.
I underwent
a kind of odd conversion from his act.

They do call minds like mine one-track.
One track is all you need
to understand
their loneliness, then bite the hand that feeds

upon you, in a terrible blind grief.

dss dream - martin espada

DSS Dream
by Martin Espada

I dreamed
the Department of Social Services
came to the door and said:
"We understand you have a baby,
a goat, and a pig living here
in a two-room apartment.
This is illegal.
We have to take the baby away,
unless you eat the goat."

"The pig's OK?" I asked.
"The pig's OK," they said.

a poem of that man - george makris

A Poem Of That Man
by George Makris (tr. Nanos Valaoritis)

At dawn when laughter and dream have vanished,
in a wooden shack, I, under a military blanket
curse the roof that lets in gusts of wind
the blackening sky and the cries of cart drivers.
I stay there with cold eyes and without a thought
of the well and other curiosities of sleep.
When on the stairs I step accidentally on the child
its mother -- with repulsive breasts -- emerges.
Never never, I swear, will I confess the truth
about the strange pleasure I feel
stepping on its fingers with clenched teeth.
The hard pavement and the calm girl holding a basket
entice my eyes and pull me along hastening
towards the morning meal full of flies and curses,
and the waiter who accidentally gouged out his eye.
An old bookseller impoverished, without memory
I drool and my eyes suffer from cataracts.
My clothes stink and I have a hard time urinating
I'm a broken sword and a sacrificed rooster
I'm the wine turned sour and the rotten egg.
Even the maid servants call me a filthy old toilet,
an aged bookseller taking his morning stroll
going straight to work with painful kidneys.
I, old bookseller, ill and unpretentious
without a thought in my head, God forbid,
sold an antique from Venice to a captain;
God bless this gracious captain.

In my youth I studied to be a lifeguard
a whole six months, I poured over elements of anatomy
submitted to strict exams, I was a hell of a lad
I made the rounds in a lifeboat wearing a cap
I saved those drowning on public beaches
Oh!  Oh! the beautiful and tough occupation
when I smelt danger patrolling those shores,
the red clouds foreboding wind.
The red horn of my gramophone
puts me in a trance me when I stare into it
like the open mouth of a patient at the dentist.
Then they find the occasion to steal my books.
The red clouds and my mustaches inside a box. . . .
These drowsy middays and suffocating evenings
a bookseller man with little knowledge
I have no need to visit the notary and I'm not afraid
of anything except the wrath of God upon the world.
An old and ailing merchant, I rise with the red clouds
up toward the Kingdom of Heaven.

side 32 - victor hernandez cruz

Side 32
by Victor Hernandez Cruz

I am glad that I am not one of those
Big Con Edison pipes that sits by the
River crying smoke
I am glad that I am not the doorknob
Of a police car patrolling the Lower
East Side
How cool I am not a subway token
That has been lost and is sitting
Quietly and lonely by the edge of
A building on 47th Street
I am nothing and no one
I am the possibility of everything
I am a man in this crazy city
I am a door and a glass of water
I am a guitar string cutting through the
Smog
Vibrating and bringing morning
My head is a butterfly
Over the traffic jams.

when - miltos sachtouris

When
by Miltos Sachtouris (tr. Dino Siotis)

When I close my eyes
my beloved starts out from faraway
she comes
and looks at me

individuality - paul klee

Individuality
by Paul Klee (tr. Anselm Hollo)

Individuality?
is not of the substance of elements.
It is an organism, indivisibly
occupied
by elementary objects of a divergent character:
if you
were to attempt division, these parts
would die.

Myself,
for instance: an entire dramatic company.

Enter an ancestor, prophetic;
enter a hero, brutal
a rake, alcoholic, to argue
with a learned professor.
A lyrical beauty, rolling her eyes
heavenward, a case
of chronic infatuation --
enter a heavy father,
to take care of that,
enter a liberal uncle -- to arbitrate. . . .
Aunt Chatterbox gossiping in a corner.
Chambermaid Lewdie, giggling.

And I, watching it all,
astonishment in my eyes.
Poised, in my left hand
a sharpened pencil.

A pregnant woman!, a mother
is planning her
entrance --
Shushhh! you
don't belong here
you
are divisible!
She fades.

spleen - charles baudelaire

Spleen
by Charles Baudelaire (tr. Sir John Squire)

When the low heavy sky weighs like a lid
Upon the spirit aching for the light
And all the wide horizon's line is hid
By a back day sadder than any night;

When the changed earth is but a dungeon dank
Where batlike Hope goes blindly fluttering
And, striking wall and roof and mouldered plank,
Bruises his tender head and timid wing;

When like grim prison bars stretch down the thin,
Straight, rigid pillars of the endless rain,
And the dumb throngs of infamous spiders spin
Their meshes in the caverns of the brain,

Suddenly, bells leap forth into the air,
Hurling a hideous uproar to the sky
As 'twere a band of homeless spirits who fare
Through the strange heavens, wailing stubbornly.

And hearses, without drum or instrument,
File slowly through my soul; crushed, sorrowful,
Weeps Hope, and Grief, fierce and omnipotent,
Plants his black banner on my drooping skull.

*

SPLEEN

by Charles Baudelaire 

Quand le ciel bas et lourd pèse comme un couvercle

Sur l'esprit gémissant en proie aux longs ennuis,

Et que de l'horizon embrassant tout le cercle

II nous verse un jour noir plus triste que les nuits;

Quand la terre est changée en un cachot humide,

Où l'Espérance, comme une chauve-souris,

S'en va battant les murs de son aile timide

Et se cognant la tête à des plafonds pourris;

Quand la pluie étalant ses immenses traînées

D'une vaste prison imite les barreaux,

Et qu'un peuple muet d'infâmes araignées

Vient tendre ses filets au fond de nos cerveaux,

Des cloches tout à coup sautent avec furie

Et lancent vers le ciel un affreux hurlement,

Ainsi que des esprits errants et sans patrie

Qui se mettent à geindre opiniâtrement.

— Et de longs corbillards, sans tambours ni musique,

Défilent lentement dans mon âme; l'Espoir,

Vaincu, pleure, et l'Angoisse atroce, despotique,

Sur mon crâne incliné plante son drapeau noir.

should, should not - czeslaw milosz

Should, Should Not
by Czeslaw Milosz

A man should not love the moon.

An ax should not lose weight in his hand.

His garden should smell of rotting apples

And grow a fair amount of nettles.

A man when he talks should not use words that are dear to him,

Or split open a seed to find out what is inside it.

He should not drop a crumb of bread, or spit in the fire

(So at least I was taught in Lithuania).

When he steps on marble stairs,

He may, the boor, try to chip them with his boot

As a reminder that the stars will not last forever.