Post your favorite poem, Part 2

(The other thread was getting so long, it took forever to load, so I started a new one. I hope you don't mind.)

And the days are not full enough
And the nights are not full enough
And life slips by like a field mouse
Not shaking the grass.

- Ezra Pound

The stars around the beautiful moon
Hide their shining forms
When she is full and shines over the earth

Sappho

#2 Hera,

Your Sappho verse was drawn by Rockwell Kent:
http://www.hollistaggart.com/artists/kent_8748.jpg

Latents

Just the hints, say
the side ridges of
fingerprints that
don't rule out
innocence; or
the loose approaches
to tightening mazes;
ambiguous, smudgy
places. The dilation
dark absorbs; the
thing we don't
think through
before it happens:
all the early
stations of desire —
the first slight tug
against the string
that threads the
wire that threads
the cable that
guys the bridge
that alien traffic
plies.

- - Kay Ryan, The Niagara River: Poems

Please indulge me, this poem is my own:

POTATOES

A family of potatoes lives under my sink.
They huddle there like wretched immigrants
in the hold of my kitchen, eyeing anyone
who peers down there with suspicion.
Despite the language barrier, they persist.
The more industrious put down roots.
They wear the same brown shabby coats
they brought from the old country,
though one or two are wrinkled now
from sleeping in them every night.
When the cupboard door is closed
I sense them in there, huddling closer,
muttering in their dark dialect, comforting
one another, whispering their dreams.

from Whispers, Cries, and Tantrums by Jay C. Davis

oh I like that abirdman.

Jay--love your poem, very evocative of all sorts of survival stories, the first to come my mind is Victor Herman's autobiography Coming Out of the Ice. Thanks so much.

Back in #5, I started to discuss the translation of Sappho in #2, but thought better of it since this long-running topic has a better purpose. But I finally got around to digging out some relevant books from the backs of shelves and at the library and put some notes into a new topic, Translating fragments, over in the poetry translation group.

A little Wallace Stevens mood music.
"Anglais Mort a Florence"

A little less returned for him each spring.
Music began to fail him. Brahms, although
His dark familiar, often walked apart.

His spirit grew uncertain of delight,
Certain of its uncertainty, in which
That dark companion left him unconsoled

For a self returning mostly memory.
Only last year he said that the naked moon
Was not the moon he used to see, to feel

(In the pale coherences of moon and mood
When he was young), naked and alien,
More leanly shining from a lankier sky.

Its ruddy pallor had grown cadaverous.
He used his reason, exercised his will,
Turning in time to Brahms as alternate

In speech. He was that music and himself.
They were particles of order, a single majesty:
But he remembered the time when he stood alone.

He stood at last by God's help and the police;
But he remembered the time when he stood alone.
He yielded himself to that single majesty;

But he remembered the time when he stood alone,
When to be and delight to be seemed to be one,
Before the colors deepened and grew small.

And for something a little more lighthearted.

The Country
by Billy Collins

I wondered about you
when you told me never to leave
a box of wooden, strike-anywhere matches
lying around the house because the mice

might get into them and start a fire.
But your face was absolutely straight
when you twisted the lid down on the round tin
where the matches, you said, are always stowed.

Who could sleep that night?
Who could whisk away the thought
of the one unlikely mouse
padding along a cold water pipe

behind the floral wallpaper
gripping a single wooden match
between the needles of his teeth?
Who could not see him rounding a corner,

the blue tip scratching against a rough-hewn beam,
the sudden flare, and the creature
for one bright, shining moment
suddenly thrust ahead of his time -

now a fire-starter, now a torchbearer
in a forgotten ritual, little brown druid
illuminating some ancient night.
Who could fail to notice,

lit up in the blazing insulation,
the tiny looks of wonderment on the faces
of his fellow mice, onetime inhabitants
of what once was your house in the country?

#7 - I love it!

#11 - poignant and beautiful

#12 - thanks for ending with this one. It's a treasure.

In my medicine cabinet
the winter fly
has died of old age.
-Jack Kerouac

I think this my favorite because it combines the flavor of Zen Poetry with American irreverence.

Old Love
by Francesca Beard

In the glance of a mirror, I saw a timid shape
standing in the bevilled bit,
the thin prismatic strip on the edge of the frame
and thought it was a ghost of you.

What are you doing here?
You can't just appear, without warning,
like we were used to it being.
You seemed blurry, like the first and the last time.
In between, how huge you were.
The shadow you cast let much sleep beneath its shade.
You wavered in the air, vanishing.
How I wanted to hold out my hand,
so that your sad ghost
could crawl into a friendly cradle.
Of course it was nothing - a trick of the light
and a splinter in the eye
of a hair gummed across the heart.

No, you are frozen where you were that last time,
deaf and dumb,
a wax-work in the pin-hole museum,
while your tiny, passionate soul,
marooned in the middle of nowhere,
cries and stretches out its arms.

Meanwhile, on my own rock,
on the other side of the world,
I think of you, blind and stumbling in the dark,
while the rescuers throw the beams of their torches
into the wrong cave.

A Winter's Tale from Dylan Thomas
(this one is really long so I'll just write half)

It is a winter's tale/
That the snow blind twilight ferries over the lakes/
And floating fields from the farm in the cup of the vales,/
The pale breath of cattle at the stealthy sail,

And the stars falling cold,/
And the smell of hay in the snow, and the far owl/
Warning among the folds, and the frozen hold/
Flocked with the sheep white smoke of the farm house cowl/
In the river wended vales where the tale was told

Once when the world turned old/
On a star of faith pure as the drifting bread,/
As the food and flames of the snow, a man unrolled/
The scrolls of fire that burned in his heart and head,/
Torn and alone in a farm house in a fold

Of fields. And burning then/
In his firelit island ringed by the winged snow/
And the dung hills white as wool and the hen/
Roosts sleeping chill till the flame of the cock crow/
Combs through the mantled yards and the morning men

Stumble out with their spades,/
The cattle stirring, the mousing cat stepping shy,/
The puffed birds hopping and hunting, the milk maids/
Gentle in their clogs over the fallen sky,/
And all the woken farm at its white trades,

He knelt, he wept, he prayed,/
By the spit and the black pot in the log bright light/
And the cup and the cut bread in the dancing shade,/
In the muffled house, in the quick of night,/
At the point of love, forsaken and afraid.

He knelt on the cold stones,/
He wept from the crest of grief, he prayed to the veiled sky/
May his hunger go howling on white bones/
Past the statues of the stables and the sky roofed sties/
And the duck pond glass and the blinding byres alone

Into the home of prayers/
And fires where he should prowl down the cloud/
Of his snow blind love and rush in the white lairs./
His naked need struck him howling and bowed/
Though no sound flowed down the hand folded air

But only the wind strung/
Hunger of birds in the fields of the bread of water, tossed/
In high corn and the harvest melting on their tongues./
And his nameless need bound him burning and lost/
When cold as snow he should run the wended vales among

The rivers mouthed in night,/
And drown in the drifts of his need, and lie curled caught/
In the always desiring centre of the white/
Inhuman cradle and the bride bed forever sought/
By the believer lost and the hurled outcast of light.

#12 I LOVE LOVE Billy Collins. I went to one of his readings in Oklahoma and he was very funny. I'll post my fav. soon...there's just too many to go through.

It's difficult for me to pick a single favorite. But one that comes up again and again near the top of my list is this one:

so much depends
upon

a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens
--William Carlos Williams

It's so simple, so graceful, so structured, and so often on my mind that I have to put it as one of the best I've yet read.

I still like his poem "This is Just to Say."

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold

I'm not sure if this is my absolute favorite poem (or section of a poem I should say), but it's definitely one of my more recent additions to the favorite pantheon.

I'll only post one section:
Highway Poems
5
ILLINOIS, INDIANA, IOWA

Austrian food is not served in Vienna,
and people in Paris drink Coke, not wine.
Lebanon has its Little League
and Warsaw its Civil War cannon.
Carthage is full of blondes,
and Cairo divides, American-style,
into white and black, money and rage.
Gnawbone keeps teasing, a tricky riddle,
and What Cheer defies punctuation,
but Stony Lonesom is all that it says.
I have seen Hindustan--Hoosier twang,
no belly dancing allowed--
and I have been in Arcadia:
one street by a railroad track,
blue chicory, goldenrod.

O telltale country, fact and mirage,
coat of many colors
stitched in homesickness, threaded with dreams,
land of seven fat cows,
is it finished, your poem?

~Lisel Mueller

Thanks to all of you for sharing these wonderful poems. Some I know and others I don't, but I am enjoying them all. Here's mine for Monday night:

Living

The fire in leaf and grass
so green it seems
each summer the last summer.

The wind blowing, the leaves
shivering in the sun,
each day the last day.

A red salamander
so cold and so
easy to catch, dreamily

moves his delicate feet
and long tail. I hold
my hand open for him to go.

Each minute the last minute.

- Denise Levertov

LIKE THIS

If anyone asks you
how the perfect satisfaction
of all our sexual wanting
will look, lift your face
and say,

Like this.

When someone mentions the gracefulness
of the night sky, climb up on the roof
and dance and say,
Like this?

If anyone wants to know what "spirit" is,
or what "God's fragrance" means,
lean your head toward him or her.
Keep your face there close.

Like this.
When someone quotes the old poetic image
about clouds gradually uncovering the moon,
slowly loosen knot by knot the strings
of your robe.
Like this?

If anyone wonders how Jesus raised the dead,
don't try to explain the miracle.
Kiss me on the lips.

Like this.

Like this.
When someone asks what it means
to "die for love," point
here.
If someone asks how tall I am, frown
and measure with your fingers the space
between the ceases on your forehead.

This tall.

The soul sometimes leaves the body, then
returns.
When someone doesn't believe that,
walk back into my house.

Like this.


When lovers moan,
they're telling our story.

Like this.

I am a sky where spirits live.
Stare into this deepening blue,
while the breeze says a secret.

Like this.
When someone asks what there is to do,
lift the candle in his hand.

Like this.




--Jelaluddin Balkhi Rumi

The cow is of the bovine ilk.
One end is moo, the other, milk.

-Ogden Nash

:D

The Termite

Some primal termite knocked on wood
And tasted it, and found it good!
And that is why your Cousin May
Fell through the parlor floor today.

Also Ogden Nash

This is terrific! Thanks for sharing

Who was it that defined poety as saying something new about the moon?

A Woman's Last Word

Let's contend no more, Love,
Strive nor weep:
All be as before, Love,
---Only sleep!

What so wild as words are?
I and thou
In debate, as birds are,
Hawk on bough!

See the creature stalking
While we speak!
Hush and hide the talking,
Cheek on cheek!

What so false as truth is,
False to thee?
Where the serpent's tooth is
Shun the tree---

Where the apple reddens
Never pry---
Lest we lose our Edens,
Eve and I.

Be a god and hold me
With a charm!
Be a man and fold me
With thine arm!

Teach me, only teach, Love
As I ought
I will speak thy speech, Love,
Think thy thought---

Meet, if thou require it,
Both demands,
Laying flesh and spirit
In thy hands.

That shall be to-morrow
Not to-night:
I must bury sorrow
Out of sight:

---Must a little weep, Love,
(Foolish me!)
And so fall asleep, Love,
Loved by thee.

Robert Browning

I haven't read much Browning and am a bit surprised to find I like this one very much.

A Tired Man

Solemn peasants in the fields
straggle homeward without a word.
Side by side we lie, the river and I,
fresh grasses slumber under my heart.

A deep calm is rolling in the river.
My heavy cares are now as light as dew.
I'm not a man, or child, "Hungarian" or "brother" -
lying here is just a tired man, like you.

Evening ladles out the quiet,
I'm a warm slice from its loaf of bread.
In the peaceful sky the stars come out
to sit on the river and shine on my head.

Attila Jozsef

Just read #7 - what a great poem, thanks for posting abirdman.

This is a hard topic for me to post in, listing just ONE poem ... oh, forget it, I'm gonna have to put two.

Earthworm by Charles Bennett

Because I taught the blackbird
how to listen, this evening
I am nothing but a song.

Where You Go When She Sleeps
by T R Hummer

What is it when a woman sleeps, her head bright
In your lap, in your hands, her breath easy now as though it had never been
Anything else, and you know she is dreaming, her eyelids
Jerk, but she is not troubled, it is a dream
That does not include you, but you are not troubled either,
It is too good to hold her while she sleeps, her hair falling
Richly on your hands, shining like metal, a color
That when you think of it you cannot name, as though it has just
Come into existence, dragging you into the world in the wake
Of its creation, out of whatever vacuum you were in before,
And you are like the boy you heard of once who fell
Into a silo full of oats, the silo emptying from below, oats
At the top swirling in a gold whirlpool, a bright eddy of grain, the boy
You imagine, leaning over the edge to see it, the noon sun breaking
Into the center of the circle he watches, hot on his back, burning
And he forgets his father's warning, stands on the edge, looks down,
The grain spinning, dizzy, and when he falls his arms go out, too thin
For wings, and he hears his father's cry somewhere, but is gone
Already, down in a gold sea, spun deep in the heart of the silo,
And when they find him, he lies still, not seeing the world
Through his body but through the deep rush of grain
Where he has gone and can never come back, though they drag him
Out, his father's tears bright on both their faces, the farmhands
Standing by blank and amazed - you touch that unnamable
Color in her hair and you are gone into what is not fear or joy
But a whirling of sunlight and water and air full of shining dust
That takes you, a dream that is not of you but will let you
Into itself if you love enough, and will not, will never let you go.

From Maya Angelou, A Brave and Startling Truth.

We, this people, on a small and lonely planet
Traveling through casual space
Past aloof stars, across the way of indifferent suns
To a destination where all signs tell us
It is possible and imperative that we learn
A brave and startling truth

And when we come to it
To the day of peacemaking
When we release our fingers
From fists of hostility
And allow the pure air to cool our palms

(It is too long to post here. You can find the rest of it at http://www.inspirationpeak.com/poetry/bravetruth.html)

Not my FAVORITE poem, but I like it:

Power to the People

Why are the stamps adorned with kings and presidents?
That we may lick their hinder parts and thump their heads.
Howard Nemerov

I love it! At least we give them a good thumping!

Speaking of Howard Nemerov:

The Sanctuary

Over the ground of slate and light gravel,
Clear water, so shallow that one can see
The numerous springs moving their mouths of sand;
And the dark trout are clearly to be seen,
Swimming this water which is color of air
So that the fish appear suspended nowhere and
In nothing. With a delicate bend and reflex
Of their tails, the trout slowly glide
From the shadowy side into the light, so clear,
And back again into the shadows; slow
And so definite, like thought emerging
Into a clear place in the mind, then going back,
Exchanging shape for shade. Now and again
One fish slides into the center of the pool
And hangs between the surface and the slate
For several minutes without moving, like
A silence in a dream; and when I stand
At such a time, observing this, my life
Seems to have been suddenly moved a great
Distance away on every side, as though
The quietest thought of all stood in the pale
Watery light alone, and was no more
My own than the speckled trout I stare upon
All but unseeing. Even at such times
The mind goes on transposing and revising
The elements of its long allegory
In which the anagogue is always death;
And while this vision blurs with empty tears,
I visit, in the cold pool of the skull,
A sanctuary where the slender trout
Feed on my drowned eyes . . . Until this trout
Pokes through the fabric of the surface to
Snap up a fly. As if a man's own eyes
Raised welts upon the mirror whence they stared,
I find this world again in focus, and
This fish, a shadow dammed in artifice,
Swims to the furthest shadows out of sight
Though not, in time's ruining stream, out of mind.

Howard Nemerov

Nemerov, Howard. New and Selected Poems. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1960.

Under The Mountain by Louis MacNeice

Seen from above
The foam in the curving bay is a goose-quill
That feathers … unfeathers … itself.

Seen from above
The field is a flap and the haycocks buttons
To keep it flush with the earth.

Seen from above
The house is a silent gadget whose purpose
Was long since obsolete.

But when you get down
The breakers are cold scum and the wrack
Sizzles with stinking life.

When you get down
The field is a failed or a worth-while crop, the source
Of back-ache if not heartache.

And when you get down
The house is a maelstrom of loves and hates where you –
Having got down – belong.

I just discovered part 2 of this post. the poems are terrific.

david perrings

Age

There you were looking out the window,
the snow just beginning to fall.
You fell asleep, just a short nap,
and woke to find a thick barricade over all.

The roof, the yard turned completely white;
new shapes, new silence, new trees.
Frost has arrived, winter is here.
And a moment ago - none of these.

- Saghatel Haroutunian (or Harutyunyan)
translated by Diana der Hovanessian

A favorite poem I just discovered, not the favorite poem of all I've read.

Turning to the Page
by Stephen Dunn

I remember that cavernous silence
after my first declaration of love,
then, feeling I must have been
misunderstood, saying it again,

and, years later, with someone else,
exclaiming, "That was so good!"
and the foreign language she -- who was
speaking English -- used in response.

I learned there's nothing more shaming
or as memorable as an intimacy
unreturned. And turned, therefore,
to the expected silence of a page,

where I might simultaneously assert
and hide, by my own disappointment,
which saved me for a while.
But soon the page whispered

I'd mistaken its vastness for a refuge,
its whiteness for a hospital
for the pathetic. Fill me up, it said,
give me sorrow because I must have joy,

all the travails of love because
distances are where the safe reside.
Bring to me, it said, continual proof
you've been alive.

The stars have not dealt me the worst they could do:
My pleasures are plenty, my troubles are two.
But oh, my two troubles they reave me of rest,
The brains in my head and the heart in my breast.

Oh grant me the ease that is granted so free,
The birthright of multitudes, give it to me,
That relish their victuals and rest on their bed
With flint in the bosom and guts in the head.

A.E Houseman

Upon Waking

at the far edge of earth, night
is going away, another
poem begins, slumped over

the typewriter i must get this
exactly, i want to make it
clear this morning that your

face, as it opens
from its shadow, is more
perfect than yesterday: and

that the light, as it
hesitates over the approach
of your smile, has given this

aching bed more warmth,
more poems; someway

a generous rose, or a very
delicate arrangement of sounds,
has come to peace in this new room.

- Denis Johnson
from The McSweeney's Book of Poets Picking Poets

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul
And sings the tune without the words
And never stops at all.

And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.

I've heard it in the chillest land
And on the strangest sea,
Yet never in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.

EMILY DICKINSON - "Hope Is The Thing With Feathers"

#42,

yes this is one of my favorite poems as well. there was a pbs show on emily probably several years go now. Also Billy Collins did a poem that was a take off on this poem which i liked as well.

david

This is not a favorite, just something I ran across today and enjoyed:

Better Than Gold

O for a Booke and a Shadie Nooke
Eyther in-a-doore or out;
With the grene leaves whisp'ring over-hede.
Or the Streete cries all aboute,
Where I maie reade all at my ease,
Bothe of the Newe and Olde,
For a jollie goode Booke whereon to looke,
Is better to me than Golde.

John Wilson (bookseller)
(1802-1868)

Thanks lorsomething I will use that at my Place in second life

:)

The poems of John Lillison, England's Greatest One-Armed Poet, as read by Dr. Michael Hfuhruhurr:

"In Dillman's Grove"

In Dillman's Grove, our love did die,
And now in ground shall ever lie.
None could e'er replace her visage,
Until your face brought thoughts of kissage.

-----------------------------------------------------
"Pointy Birds"

O pointy birds, O pointy pointy,
Anoint my head, anointy-nointy.

Applause applause! I write poetry too! I'll have to include one sometime...

D. H. Lawrence is my favorite poet. I especially like his poems on death & dying.

Or his love poems!

Also, like Sylvia Plath.

keep writing!

When first we faced, and touching showed
How well we knew the early moves,
Behind the moonlight and the frost,
The excitement and the gratitude,
There stood how much our meeting owed
To other meetings, other loves.

The decades of a different life
That opened past your inch-close eyes
Belonged to others, lavished, lost;
Nor could I hold you hard enough
To call my years of hunger-strife
Back for your mouth to colonise.

Admitted: and the pain is real.
But when did love not try to change
The world back to itself--no cost,
No past, no people else at all--
Only what meeting made us feel,
So new, and gentle-sharp, and strange?

Philip Larkin

The Farm in Coleraine

James Hoch

I heard a rumor
the midwife wrapped the cord
with gauze and sunk it

in a jar of vinegar,
sealed it with wax, set the jar
in a strong box, muttered

a prayer, then buried
the cord in the cellar floor
of the stone house

which stands now
like a dead tree edging the field.
That was a long time ago,

before I could think of such things,
before my mother, too,
was secure in the ground,

and I had grown accustomed
to the long shears that leave us
walking dumb in the world,

dumb with a desire for what
we cannot know, across this field
like the face of some old child.

Sometimes rooting around in your stuff can be enjoyable. I just ran across Summons, an oldie by Robert Francis, which I like very much:

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/summons/

Annus Mirabilis

Sexual intercourse began
In nineteen sixty-three
(which was rather late for me) -
Between the end of the Chatterley ban
And the Beatles' first LP.

Up to then there'd only been
A sort of bargaining,
A wrangle for the ring,
A shame that started at sixteen
And spread to everything.

Then all at once the quarrel sank:
Everyone felt the same,
And every life became
A brilliant breaking of the bank,
A quite unlosable game.

So life was never better than
In nineteen sixty-three
(Though just too late for me) -
Between the end of the Chatterley ban
And the Beatles' first LP.

Philip Larkin

The greatest sonnet of all time. Mighty tall claim, I know, but I've been living with this poem my whole life (or so it seems). I wrote an 85 page thesis about it once upon a time and that's when I came to the realization that a great poem is inexplicable, untranslatable, and wholly and completely numinous.

The Windhover
To Christ our Lord

I caught this morning morning's minion, king-
dom of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dáwn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
Of the rólling level úndernéath him steady áir, & stríding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,
As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl & gliding
Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird, -- the achieve of, the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty & valour & act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, o my chevalier!

No wónder of it: shéer plód makes plóugh down síllion
Shine, & blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gáll themsélves, & gásh góld-vermílion.

Gerard Manley Hopkins

I'm a Carrion Comfort person meself, but most any of Hopkins' sonnets will do

The Albatross

Often, to pass the time on board, the crew
will catch an albatross, one of those big birds
which nonchalantly chaperone a ship
across the bitter fathoms of the sea.

Tied to the deck, this sovereign of space,
as if embarrassed by its clumsiness,
pitiably lets its great white wings
drag at its sides like a pair of unshipped oars.

How weak and awkward, even comical
this traveller but lately so adroit -
one deckhand sticks a pipestem in its beak,
another mocks the cripple that once flew!

The poet is like this monarch of the clouds
riding the storm above the markman's range;
exiled on the ground, hooted and jeered,
he cannot walk because of his great wings.

Baudelaire, translated by Richard Howard

The Albatross is a great poem, very interesting observation, thanks for posting it.

I think the act of writing poetry requires one to remove oneself, at least temporarly, from the rest of the world and become and observer.

david

Hera this is beautiful! More please.

In Tsarskoye Selo

They're leading the horses along the allee,
long are the waves of combed-out manes.
Oh enchanting little town of riddles,
though I love you, I am mournful.

It's strange to remember: my soul yearned,
it panted, delirious, near death.
Now I've become a plaything,
like my rosy friend the cockatoo.

No hint of pain oppresses my breast,
if you like, look into my eyes.
But I don't like the hour before sunset,
the wind from the sea and the word: "leave!"

Anna Akhmatova, tr. by Judith Hemschemeyer

#58. Wonderful poem. Oct. 10 was my birthday. Your posting was an unintentional present. I'll have to re-read Akhmatova. It's been too long.

Have just re-read the Poems in this thread. So many wonderful poems so little time!

I got this one in my email today and loved it:

The Name

Instead of an idea a name comes to you, a name that no longer has any connection to the owner of the name. It sounds merely rhythmic, musical, exotic and foreign to your ears, a sound full of distance and mystery. A name such as Desmond Tutu, Patrice Lumumba or Menachem Begin. You forget the names of acquaintances and the name of your first true love but this name comes to you. It repeats like a tune in your head. It refuses to go away, becomes a kind of mental mumbling. You say it to yourself over and over. It is your mantra, "Boutros Boutros Ghali..." Then suddenly as it came, the name vanishes.

Deep in the night, long after your own name has flown away, a voice wakes you from a sound sleep, a voice clear and certain as the voice that summonded Elija, saying "Oksana Baiul."

- Louis Jenkins from The Winter Road

I've been reading Kim Addonizio's Tell Me, and here's one of several that hit me hard:

Prayer

Sometimes, when we're lying after love,
I look at you and see your body's future
of lying beneath the earth; putting the heel
of my hand against your rib I feel how faint
and far away the heartbeat is. I rest
my cheek against your left nipple and listen
to the surge of blood, seeing your life splashed out,
filmy water hurled from a pot
onto dry grass. And I want to be pressed
deep into the bed and covered over,
the way a seed is pressed into a hole,
the dirt tramped down with a trowel.
I want to be a failed seed, the kind
that doesn't grow, that doesn't know it's meant to.
I want to lie here without moving, lifeless
as an animal that's slaughtered, its blood smeared
on a doorpost, I want death to take me if it
has to, to spare you, I want it to pass over.

I like you calm, as if you were absent,
and you hear me far-off, and my voice does not touch you.

It seems that your eyelids have taken to flying:

it seems that a kiss has sealed up your mouth.



Since all these things are filled with my spirit,

you come from things, filled with my spirit.

You appear as my soul, as the butterfly’s dreaming,

and you appear as Sadness’s word.



I like you calm, as if you were distant,

you are a moaning, a butterfly’s cooing.

You hear me far-off, my voice does not reach you.

Let me be calmed, then, calmed by your silence.



Let me commune, then, commune with your silence,

clear as a light, and pure as a ring.

You are like night, calmed, constellated.

Your silence is star-like, as distant, as true.



I like you calm, as if you were absent:

distant and saddened, as if you were dead.

One word at that moment, a smile, is sufficient.

And I thrill, then, I thrill: that it cannot be so.

Pablo Neruda

Hay for the Horses

He had driven half the night
From far down San Joaquin
Through Mariposa, up the
Dangerous Mountain roads,
And pulled in at eight a.m.
With his big truckload of hay
behind the barn.

With winch and ropes and hooks
We stacked the bales up clean
To splintery redwood rafters
High in the dark, flecks of alfalfa
Whirling through shingle-cracks of light,
Itch of haydust in the
sweaty shirt and shoes.
At lunchtime under Black oak
Out in the hot corral,
---The old mare nosing lunchpails,
Grasshoppers crackling in the weeds---
"I'm sixty-eight" he said,
"I first bucked hay when I was seventeen.
I thought, that day I started,
I sure would hate to do this all my life.
And dammit, that's just what
I've gone and done."

- Gary Snyder

I cannot choose a favorite poem, that's impossible, but I have this one memorized and love it dearly.

If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can stop one heart the aching,
or cool one pain,
or help one fainting robin
unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.

-Emily Dickinson

I loved the Potato poem Jay!

Your choice by Emily Dickinson Vidya is one all mental health counselors or healers should know!

>55 exnihilo35:

That poem sounded so naggingly familiar, and then I realized that I know it in a different translation, Richard Wilbur's:

Often, for pastime, mariners will ensnare
The albatross, that vast sea-bird who sweeps
On high companionable pinion where
Their vessel glides upon the bitter deeps.

Torn from his native space, this captive king
Flounders upon the deck in stricken pride,
And pitiably lets his great white wing
Drag like a heavy paddle at his side.

This rider of winds, how awkward he is, and weak!
How droll he seems, who was all grace of late!
A sailor pokes a pipestem into his beak;
Another, hobbling, mocks his trammeled gait.

The Poet is like this monarch of the clouds,
Familiar of storms, of stars, and of all high things;
Exiled on earth amidst its hooting crowds,
He cannot walk, borne down by giant wings.

---------

Another of Wilbur's poems is one of my favourites:

To The Etruscan Poets

Dream fluently, still brothers, who when young
Took with your mothers' milk the mother tongue,

In which pure matrix, joining world and mind,
You strove to leave some line of verse behind

Like a fresh track across a field of snow,
Not reckoning that all could melt and go.

--------

Another of my favourites, "Advice to a Prophet", is a bit too long to transcribe but can be read online.

#65,

great poem,

reminds me of another poem by Billy Collins which was a take on Emily's Poetry.

Taking Off Emily Dickinson's Clothes


First, her tippet made of tulle,
easily lifted off her shoulders and laid
on the back of a wooden chair.

And her bonnet,
the bow undone with a light forward pull.

Then the long white dress, a more
complicated matter with mother-of-pearl
buttons down the back,
so tiny and numerous that it takes forever
before my hands can part the fabric,
like a swimmer's dividing water,
and slip inside.

You will want to know
that she was standing
by an open window in an upstairs bedroom,
motionless, a little wide-eyed,
looking out at the orchard below,
the white dress puddled at her feet
on the wide-board, hardwood floor.

The complexity of women's undergarments
in nineteenth-century America
is not to be waved off,
and I proceeded like a polar explorer
through clips, clasps, and moorings,
catches, straps, and whalebone stays,
sailing toward the iceberg of her nakedness.

Later, I wrote in a notebook
it was like riding a swan into the night,
but, of course, I cannot tell you everything -
the way she closed her eyes to the orchard,
how her hair tumbled free of its pins,
how there were sudden dashes
whenever we spoke.

What I can tell you is
it was terribly quiet in Amherst
that Sabbath afternoon,
nothing but a carriage passing the house,
a fly buzzing in a windowpane.

So I could plainly hear her inhale
when I undid the very top
hook-and-eye fastener of her corset

and I could hear her sigh when finally it was unloosed,
the way some readers sigh when they realize
that Hope has feathers,
that reason is a plank,
that life is a loaded gun
that looks right at you with a yellow eye.

Billy Collins




david

One of my favorite West Country poets:
Thomas Hardy

Waiting Both
A star looks down at me,
And says: "Here I and you
Stand each in our degree:
What do you mean to do,—

Mean to do?"

I say: "For all I know,
Wait, and let Time go by,
Till my change come."—"Just so,"
The star says: "So mean I:—
So mean I."

Kuan Yin by Laura Fargas

Of the many buddhas I love best the girl
who will not leave the cycle of pain before anyone else.
It is not the captain declining to be saved
on the sinking ship, who may just want to ride his shame
out of sight. She is at the brink of never being hurt again

but pauses to say, All of us. Every blade of grass.
She chooses to live in the tumble of souls through time.
Perhaps she sees spring in every country,
talks quietly with farm women while helping to lay seed.
Our hearts are a storm she trembles at. I picture her
leaning on a tree or humming or joining a volleyball game
on Santa Monica beach. Her skin shines with sweat.
The others may not know how to notice what she does to them.
She is not a fish or a bee; it is not pity or thirst;
she could go, but here she is.

Just one poem?? Oh well I slipp one in for now that is befitting the book-site we are on, but I have at least two more that I really want to share here.

Among His Books

My days among the Dead are past;
Around me I behold,
Where'er these casual eyes are cast,
The mighty minds of old:
My never-failing friends are they,
With whom I converse day by day.

With them I take delight in weal
And seek relief in woe;
And while I understand and feel
How much to them I owe,
My cheeks have often been bedewed
With tears of thoughtful gratitude.

My thoughts are with the Dead; with them
I live in long-past years,
Their virtues love, their faults condemn,
Partake their hopes and fears,
And from ther lessons seek and find
Instruction with a humble mind.

My hopes are with the Dead; anon
My place with them will be,
And I with them shall travel on
Through all Futurity;
Yet leaving here a name, I trust,
That will not perish in the dust.

By Robert Southey.

From Rugby Chapel, by Matthew Arnold:

and then they die—
Perish;—and no one asks
Who or what they have been,
More than he asks what waves,
In the moonlit solitudes mild 70
Of the midmost Ocean, have swell’d,
Foam’d for a moment, and gone.

#22 Wow, Tim-Watkinson, that is a one beautiful poem! I Love it! Have to check Rumi out. Thanx for expending my poetic horizon to the east once more.....

a nod and a smile, Pandora (my eyes careful to keep a watch on the lid there of that box . . .)

treasures such as Rumi are meant to be shared wide and wild across this earth, you'll find much of his work readily available in bits and pieces all over the internet. I envy your finding him, new again. and thanks for the Southey, I'll have to find a few more of his, find out more about him, etc ...

and welcome to the LT, i know your presence here will be enjoyed by all of us who love finding poems.

re#75 Thank you for your warm words of welcome Tim. I appreciate it. I have already done some checking about -as I know now- the persian sufi mystic Rumi was.
I should have know'n those words are mystical divine and can only come from somebody who found enlightendment....

Oh, and don't worry about the lid, I am not THAT Pandora, I have a Tom Hanks approach....I am the box-of chocolates-Pandora. I believe life is full of good things if you choose wisely. i.e. I intend to let only GOOD things out of the box. You know, the silver lining...(Oh, this is going to haunt me now I have exposed myself like this; Me and my mystical marvellings.........;)

Labour is blossoming or dancing where
The body is not bruised to pleasure soul,
Nor beauty born out of its own despair,
Nor blear-eyed wisdom out of midnight oil.
O chestnut-tree, great-rooted blossomer,
Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bole?
O body swayed to music, O brightening glance,
How can we know the dancer from the dance?

~William Butler Yeats

I hope this isn't too strange...

ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S FAVORITE POEM

"I would give all I am worth, and go into debt, to be able to write so fine a piece as I think that is. Neither do I know who is the author. I met it in a straggling form in a newspaper last summer, and I remember to have seen it once before, about fifteen years ago, and this is all I know about it." Abraham Lincoln wrote those lines in a letter to a friend, Andrew Johnston (a lawyer in Quincy, Illinois), on April 18, 1846.
The piece Lincoln was referring to was titled Mortality or Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud? The author was a Scotsman named William Knox (1789-1825). Dr. Jason Duncan first introduced Lincoln to the poem when the two were living in New Salem. Lincoln memorized the entire poem and recited it so often that some folks mistakenly thought he was the author. The poem's melancholy tone appealed to Lincoln. William Herndon, Lincoln's law partner, thought the poem was (for Lincoln) a remembrance of Ann Rutledge as well as a discourse on the delicate nature of human life.

The lines of Mortality are as follows:

Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud?
Like a swift-fleeting meteor, a fast-flying cloud,
A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave,
He passes from life to his rest in the grave.

The leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade,
Be scattered around, and together be laid;
And the young and the old, the low and the high,
Shall molder to dust, and together shall lie.

The infant a mother attended and loved;
The mother that infant's affection who proved;
The husband, that mother and infant who blessed;
Each, all, are away to their dwelling of rest.

The maid on whose cheek, on whose brow, in whose eye,
Shone beauty and pleasure - her triumphs are by;
And the memory of those who loved her and praised,
Are alike from the minds of the living erased.

The hand of the king that the sceptre hath borne,
The brow of the priest that the mitre hath worn,
The eye of the sage, and the heart of the brave,
Are hidden and lost in the depths of the grave.

The peasant, whose lot was to sow and to reap,
The herdsman, who climbed with his goats up the steep,
The beggar, who wandered in search of his bread,
Have faded away like the grass that we tread.

The saint, who enjoyed the communion of Heaven,
The sinner, who dared to remain unforgiven,
The wise and the foolish, the guilty and just,
Have quietly mingled their bones in the dust.

So the multitude goes - like the flower or the weed
That withers away to let others succeed;
So the multitude comes - even those we behold,
To repeat every tale that has often been told.

For we are the same that our fathers have been;
We see the same sights that our fathers have seen;
We drink the same stream, we feel the same sun,
And run the same course that our fathers have run.

The thoughts we are thinking, our fathers would think;
From the death we are shrinking, our fathers would shrink;
To the life we are clinging, they also would cling -
But it speeds from us all like a bird on the wing.

They loved - but the story we cannot unfold;
They scorned - but the heart of the haughty is cold;
They grieved - but no wail from their slumber will come;
They joyed - but the tongue of their gladness is dumb.

They died - aye, they died - we things that are now,
That walk on the turf that lies over their brow,
And make in their dwellings a transient abode,
Meet the things that they met on their pilgrimage road.

Yea, hope and despondency, pleasure and pain,
Are mingled together in sunshine and rain;
And the smile and the tear, the song and the dirge,
Still follow each other, like surge upon surge.

'Tis the wink of an eye - 'tis the draught of a breath -
From the blossom of health to the paleness of death,
From the gilded saloon to the bier and the shroud
Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud?



Abraham Lincoln had a lifelong interest in both reading and writing poetry. Another favorite of his was The Last Leaf by Oliver Wendell Holmes. To read some poems written by Lincoln please see the 1991 Applewood Books publication entitled The Poems of Abraham Lincoln.
A good source of poetry written about Abraham Lincoln is The Poets' Lincoln: Tributes in Verse to the Martyred President edited by Osborn H. Oldroyd.

"Autumn evening--
it's no light thing,
being born a man"

- Kobayashi Issa

an old favorite:

Episode in a Library
Zbigniew Herbert

A blonde girl is bent over a poem. With a pencil sharp as a lancet she transfers the words to a blank page and changes them into strokes, accents, caesuras. The lament of a fallen poet now looks like a salamander eaten away by ants.

When we carried him away under machine-gun fire, I believed that his still warm body would be resurrected in the word. Now as I watch the death of the words, I know there is no limit to decay. All that will be left after us in the black earth will be scattered syllables. Accents over nothingness and dust.

The wind blows hard among the pines
Toward the beginning
Of an endless past.
Listen: you've heard everything.

-Shinkichi Takahashi

I very much love The Lady of Shallot and The Charge of the Light Brigade by Alfred Lord Tennyson but I think my favourite poem is A Birthday by Christina Rossetti.

My heart is like a singing bird
Whose nest is in a water'd shoot;
My heart is like an apple-tree
Whose boughts are bent with thick-set fruit;
My heart is like a rainbow shell
That paddles in a halcyon sea;
My heart is gladder than all these,
Because my love is come to me.

Raise me a dais of silk and down;
Hang it with vair and purple dyes;
Carve it in doves and pomegranates,
And peacocks with a hundred eyes;
Work it in gold and silver grapes,
In leaves and silver fluer-de-lyes;
Because the birthday of my life
Is come, my love is come to me.

It makes me happy to read those words so that's why it's my favourite.

I also like Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came by Robert Browning, partly because it is a very good poem and partly because it inspired Stephen King to write his Dark Tower books.

mess 80

This immediately made me think of an opposing thought by Emily Dickinson

THAT I did always love,
I bring thee proof:
That till I loved
I did not love enough.

That I shall love alway,
I offer thee
That love is life,
And life hath immortality.

This, dost thou doubt, sweet?
Then have I
Nothing to show
But Calvary.

Footprints in the Sand

One night I dreamed I was walking along the beach with the Lord.
Many scenes from my life flashed across the sky.
In each scene I noticed footprints in the sand.
Sometimes there were two sets of footprints,
other times there were one set of footprints.

This bothered me because I noticed
that during the low periods of my life,
when I was suffering from
anguish, sorrow or defeat,
I could see only one set of footprints.

So I said to the Lord,
"You promised me Lord,
that if I followed you,
you would walk with me always.
But I have noticed that during the most trying periods of my life
there have only been one set of footprints in the sand.
Why, when I needed you most, you have not been there for me?"

The Lord replied,
"The times when you have seen only one set of footprints in the sand,
is when I carried you."

~ Mary Stevenson

The Taoist Way To Confidence
by John Tagliabue


If
you
confide
in
the
universe
it
will
confide
in
you
it
will

hide
you
the
way
a
bride
hides
a
seed
it
will

reveal
you
the
way
a
need
reveals
the
universe

I already posted my favourite poem over in the "Poetry that brings a tear to your eye" topic - see

http://www.librarything.com/talktopic.php?topic=15350#462046

But another great favourite is Ulysses, by Alfred Lord Tennyson, online at

http://www.metalvortex.com/poems/ulysses-.htm

The whole poem is magnificent, but a little long to quote here, so I'll confine myself to its famous closing lines:

Come, my friends.
'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down;
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are,--
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

by: Sri Chinmoy


Your mind has a flood of questions.
There is but one teacher
Who can answer them
Who is that teacher?
Your silence-loving heart.

The Lovers

The lovers say nothing.
Love is the finest of the silences,
the one that trembles most and is hardest to bear.
The lovers are looking for something.
The lovers are the ones who abandon,
the ones who change, who forget.
Their hearts tell them that they will never find.
They don't find, they're looking.

The lovers wander around like crazy people
because they're alone, alone,
surrendering, giving themselves to each moment,
crying because they don't save love.
They worry about love. The lovers
live for the day, it's the best they can do, it's all they know.
They're going away all the time,
all the time, going somewhere else.
They hope,
not for anything in particular, they just hope.
They know that whatever it is they will not find it.
Love is the perpetual deferment,
always the next step, the other, the other.
The lovers are the insatiable ones,
the ones who must always, fortunately, be alone.

The lovers are the serpent in the story.
They have snakes instead of arms.
The veins in their necks swell
like snakes too, suffocating them.
The lovers can't sleep
because if they do the worms ear them.

They open their eyes in the dark
and terror falls into them.

They find scorpions under the sheet
and their bed floats as though on a lake.

The lovers are crazy, only crazy
with no God and no devil.

The lovers come out of their caves
trembling, starving,
chasing phantoms.
They laugh at those who know all about it,
who love forever, truly,
at those who believe in love as an inexhaustible lamp.

The lovers play at picking up water,
tattooing smoke, at staying where they are.
They play the long sad game of love.
None of them will give up.
The lovers are ashamed to reach any agreement.

Empty, but empty from one rib to another,
death ferments them behind the eyes,
and on they go, they weep toward morning
in the trains, and the roosters wake into sorrow.

Sometimes a scent of newborn earth reaches them,
of women sleeping with a hand on their sex, contented,
of gentle streams, and kitchens.

The lovers start singing between their lips
a song that is not learned.
And they go on crying, crying
for beautiful life.

- Jaime Sabines

Translated by W.S. Merwin

What an absorbing, wonderful poem. Thanks so much for posting it. I loved:

The lovers play at picking up water,
tattooing smoke,

that is just amazing to me.

Jaime Sabines is quite amazing.

You Have What I Look For
by Jaime Sabines

You have what I look for, what I long for, what I love,
you have it.
The fist of my heart is beating, calling.
I thank the stories for you,
I thank your mother and father
and death who has not seen you.
I thank the air for you.
You are elegant as wheat,
delicate as the outline of your body.
I have never loved a slender woman
but you have made my hands fall in love,
you moored my desire,
you caught my eyes like two fish.
And for this I am at your door, waiting.

Translated by W.S. Merwin

Here are a couple I really like:

Arcturis is his other name,
I 'd rather call him star!
It 's so unkind of science
To go and interfere!

I pull a flower from the woods,
A monster with a glass
Computes the stamens in a breath,
And has her in a class.

Whereas I took the butterfly
Aforetime in my hat,
He sits erect in cabinets,
The clover-bells forgot.

What once was heaven, is zenith now.
Where I proposed to go
When time's brief masquerade was done,
Is mapped, and charted too!

What if the poles should frisk about
And stand upon their heads!
I hope I 'm ready for the worst,
Whatever prank betides!

Perhaps the kingdom of Heaven 's changed!
I hope the children there
Won't be new-fashioned when I come,
And laugh at me, and stare!

I hope the father in the skies
Will lift his little girl,
Old-fashioned, naughty, everything,
Over the stile of pearl!

--Emily Dickinson

and...

i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth
day of life and love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any--lifted from the no
of all nothing--human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

--e e cummings

Say I Am You

I am dust particles in sunlight.
I am the round sun.

To the bits of dust I say, Stay.
To the sun, Keep moving.

I am morning mist,
and the breathing of evening.

I am wind in the top of a grove,
and surf on the cliff.

Mast, rudder, helmsman, and keel,
I am also the coral reef they founder on.

I am a tree with a trained parrot in its branches.

Silence, thought, and voice.

The musical air coming through a flute,

A spark of stone, a flickering in metal.

Both candle and the moth crazy around it.

Rose, and the nightingale lost in the fragrance.

I am all orders of being,
the circling galaxy,
the evolutionary intelligence.

The lift, and the falling away.

What is, and what isn't.

You who know, Jelaluddin,
You the one in all, say who I am.

Say I am you.

~ Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi

i can't count the years that i've wished to have been there, a companion sharing a path with Rumi, maybe spending a few days on a road between towns,

watching his mind, the way his words work.

great pick, cabanagirl. thank you.

Smiling...

MEMENTO VIVERE

Love while you've got
love to give.
Live while you've got
life to live.

- Piet Hein

mess 45

Makes me want more.

The Poet

Tom Wayman

Loses his position on worksheet or page in textbook
May speak much but makes little sense
Cannot give clear verbal instructions
Does not understand what he reads
Does not understand what he hears
Cannot handle “yes-no” questions

Has great difficulty interpreting proverbs
Has difficulty recalling what he ate for breakfast, etc.
Cannot tell a story from a picture
Cannot recognize visual absurdities

Has difficulty classifying and categorizing objects
Has difficulty retaining such things as
addition and subtraction facts, or multiplication tables
May recognize a word one day and not the next

**This has "me" written all over it**

While entering books, I came across a copy of Longfellow. It's strange how a poem or book affects one differently at various stages of our life.

I was introduced to Longfellow at about age 9 when the class was preparing for a visit to his childhood home. I liked The Village Blacksmith because of the giant swinging the sledg.

About thirty years later, I selected the poem for use in a Toastmasters' competition. It was the right length, dramatic, with changes in mood. It earned me a first place trophy.

Now fifty-five years later, I read his work and wonder at his understanding of the people and events of the time. As with many poets, his work could just as easily fit in a library classifcation other than poetry.

The Village Blacksmith

UNDER a spreading chestnut-tree
The village smithy stands;
The smith, a mighty man is he,
With large and sinewy hands;
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands.

His hair is crisp, and black, and long,
His face is like the tan;
His brow is wet with honest sweat,
He earns whate'er he can,
And looks the whole world in the face,
For he owes not any man.

Week in, week out, from morn till night,
You can hear his bellows blow;
You can hear him swing his heavy sledge,
With measured beat and slow,
Like a sexton ringing the village bell,
When the evening sun is low.

And children coming home from school
Look in at the open door;
They love to see the flaming forge,
And hear the bellows roar,
And catch the burning sparks that fly
Like chaff from a threshing-floor.

He goes on Sunday to the church,
And sits among his boys;
He hears the parson pray and preach,
He hears his daughter's voice,
Singing in the village choir,
And it makes his heart rejoice.

It sounds to him like her mother's voice,
Singing in Paradise!
He needs must think of her once more,
How in the grave she lies;
And with his hard, rough hand he wipes
A tear out of his eyes.

Toiling,---rejoicing,---sorrowing,
Onward through life he goes;
Each morning sees some task begin,
Each evening sees it close;
Something attempted, something done,
Has earned a night's repose.

Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend,
For the lesson thou hast taught!
Thus at the flaming forge of life
Our fortunes must be wrought;
Thus on its sounding anvil shaped
Each burning deed and thought.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

wonderful! Thanks

Selecting a Reader

by
Ted Kooser

First, I would have her be beautiful,
and walking carefully up on my poetry
at the loneliest moment of an afternoon,
her hair still damp at the neck
from washing it. She should be wearing
a raincoat, an old one, dirty
from not having money enough for the cleaners.
She will take out her glasses, and there
in the bookstore, she will thumb
over my poems, then put the book back
up on its shelf. She will say to herself,
"For that kind of money, I can get
my raincoat cleaned." And she will.

( I dunno, I just liked it.)

LOL
I dunno; I just loved it.
thanks ;

I agree, there is something refreshing about this little poem.

A number of years ago I remember watching and episode of the Andy Griffith Show where Aunt Bee was involve with some contest at the county fair involving pickles. By the end of the so all i wanted to do was eat a pickle.

Well I need to go, I have some dry cleaning I need to take care of.

David Perrings

since this IS part 2..even though i posted earlier, a modern poem not unlike that of the metaphysical poets in some ways.
Also... NCarolina's best ever, I think.

Swells - A.R. Ammons

The very longest swell in the ocean, I suspect,
carries the deepest memory, the information of actions
summarized (surface peaks and dibbles and local sharp

slopes of windstorms) with a summary of the summaries
and under other summaries a deeper summary: well, maybe
deeper, longer for length here is the same as deep

time: so that the longest swell swells least; that
is, its effects in immediate events are least
perceptible, a pitch to white water rising say a millimeter more

because of an old invisible presence: and on the ocean
floor an average so vast occurs it moves in a noticeability
of a thousand years, every blip, though, of surface and

intermediacy moderated into account: I like to go
to old places where the effect dwells, summits or seas
so hard to summon into mind, even with the natural

ones hard to climb or weigh: I go there in my mind
(which is, after all, where these things negotiably are)
and tune in to the wave nearly beyond rise or fall in its

staying and hum the constant, universal assimilation: the
information, so packed, nearly silenced with majesty
and communicating hardly any action: go there and

rest from the ragged and rapid pulse, the immediate threat
shot up in a disintegrating spray, the many thoughts and
sights unmanageable, the deaths of so many, hungry or mad.

I have known this by heart for over 50 years, and often say it to myself:

THE BIVOUAC OF THE DEAD

by:Theodore O'Hara (1820-1867)

HE muffled drum's sad roll has beat
The soldier's last tattoo;
No more on Life's parade shall meet
That brave and fallen few.
On Fame's eternal camping-ground
Their silent tents are spread,
And Glory guards, with solemn round,
The bivouac of the dead.

No rumor of the foe's advance
Now swells upon the wind;
No troubled thought at midnight haunts
Of loved ones left behind;
No vision of the morrow's strife
The warrior's dream alarms;
No braying horn nor screaming fife
At dawn shall call to arms.

Their shivered swords are red with rust;
Their plumèd heads are bowed;
Their haughty banner, trailed in dust,
Is now their martial shroud.
And plenteous funeral tears have washed
The red stains from each brow,
And the proud forms, by battle gashed,
Are free from anguish now.

The Neighing troop, the flashing blade,
The bugle's stirring blast,
The charge, the dreadful cannonade,
The din and shout, are past;
Nor war's wild note, nor glory's peal,
Shall thrill with fierce delight
Those breasts that nevermore may feel
The rapture of the fight.

Like the fierce northern hurricane
That sweeps his great plateau,
Flushed with the triumph yet to gain,
Came down the serried foe.
Who heard the thunder of the fray
Break o'er the field beneath,
Knew well the watchword of that day
Was "Victory or Death."

Long had the doubtful conflict raged
O'er all that stricken plain,
For never fiercer fight had waged
The vengeful blood of Spain;
And still the storm of battle blew,
Still swelled the glory tide;
Not long, our stout old chieftain knew,
Such odds his strength could bide.

'T was in that hour his stern command
Called to a martyr's grave
The flower of his belovèd land,
The nation's flag to save.
By rivers of their fathers' gore
His first-born laurels grew,
And well he deemed the sons would pour
Their lives for glory too.

Full many a norther's breath has swept
O'er Angostura's plain,
And long the pitying sky has wept
Above its mouldered slain.
The raven's scream or eagle's flight,
Or shepherd's pensive lay,
Alone awakes each sullen height
That frowned o'er that dread fray.

Sons of the dark and bloody ground,
Ye must not slumber there,
Where stranger steps and tongues resound
Along the heedless air.
Your own proud land's heroic soil
Shall be your fitter grave;
She claims from war his richest spoil--
The ashes of her brave.

Thus 'neath their parent turf they rest,
Far from the glory field,
Borne to a Spartan mother's breast
On many a bloody shield;
The sunshine of their native sky
Smiles sadly on them here,
And kindred eyes and hearts watch by
The heroes' sepulcher.

Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead!
Dear as the blood ye gave;
No impious footstep here shall tread
The herbage of your grave;
Nor shall your story be forgot,
While Fame her record keeps,
Or Honor points the hallowed spot
Where Valor proudly sleeps.

Yon marble minstrel's voiceless stone
In deathless song shall tell,
When many a vanished age hath flown,
The story how ye fell;
Nor wreck, nor change, nor winter's blight,
Nor Time's remorseless doom,
Shall dim one ray of glory's light
That gilds your deathless tomb.

"The Bivouac of the Dead" is reprinted from The Little Book of American Poets: 1787-1900. Ed. Jessie B. Rittenhouse. Cambridge: Riverside Press, 1915.

My favorite poem is one I studied in college. I'll give you the original German (substituting an extra e for the umlaut, as I don't know how to make one on this keyboard), and then a rough translation:

Mondnacht by Joseph von Eichendorff

Es war, als haett der Himmel
Die Erde still gekuesst,
Dass sie im Bluetenschimmer
Von ihm nun traeumen muesst'.

Die Luft ging durch die Felder,
Die Aehren wogten sacht,
Es rauschten leis die Waelder,
So sternklar war die Nacht.

Und meine Seele spannte
Weit ihre Fluegel aus,
Flog durch die stillen Lande,
Als floege sie nach Haus.

Moon-night

It was, as if heaven
silently kissed the earth,
so that she, in blossom-shimmer,
must have only dreamed of him.

The wind went through the fields,
the grasses undulated gently,
The forests rustled softly,
so star-clear was the night.

And my soul spread
wide out its wings,
flew through the quiet countryside,
as if it would fly home.

The beauty of the German language is that one can create compound words very easily, allowing for almost infinite imagery. Sternklar/star-clear; Bluetenschimmer/shimmering of blossoms; Mondnacht/moon-night, or night of the moon. Beautiful.

I took this from my old college textbook, German Poetry: A Critical Anthology by Robert M. Browning.

Why Latin Should Still Be Taught in High School
by Christopher Bursk


Because one day I grew so bored
with Lucretius, I fell in love
with the one object that seemed to be stationary,
the sleeping kid two rows up,
the appealing squalor of his drooping socks.
While the author of De Rerum Natura was making fun
of those who fear the steep way and lose the truth,
I was studying the unruly hairs on Peter Diamond’s right leg.
Titus Lucretius Caro labored, dactyl by dactyl
to convince our Latin IV class of the atomic
composition of smoke and dew,
and I tried to make sense of a boy’s ankles,
the calves’ intriguing
resiliency, the integrity to the shank,
the solid geometry of my classmate’s body.
Light falling through blinds,
a bee flinging itself into a flower,
a seemingly infinite set of texts
to translate and now this particular configuration of atoms
who was given a name at birth,
Peter Diamond, and sat two rows in front of me,
his long arms, his legs that like Lucretius’s hexameters
seemed to go on forever, all this hurly-burly
of matter that had the goodness to settle
long enough to make a body
so fascinating it got me
through fifty-five minutes
of the nature of things.

A marvellous twist on cause and effect.

My current favorite poems: "Let Evening Come" by Jane Kenyon and "The Moose" by Elizabeth Bishop

There are too many to list a single favorite, but autumn always calls this one to mind. William Shakespeare, of course, Sonnet 28.

That time of year thou may'st in me behold
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,
Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.

In me thou see'st the ending of such day
As after sunset fadeth in the west,
Which by and by black night doth take away,
Death's second self, that seals up all in rest.

In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire
That on the ashes of his youth doth lie
As the death-bed whereon it must expire,
Consumed by that which it was nourish'd by.

This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong,
To love that well which thou must leave ere long.

Thanks Aprilfollies, that was beautiful.

Once outside its
flowerpot,
The tree ceases
To be a bonsai
- Alejandro Zambra

Kordo: I like that one - beautiful, and completely new to me.

I COULD WRITE...

1 quote 4 that!

'Be Yourself'

I could write the many things i wish to say,

Here, now, just to enchant ur mind

And then, to delet all i wrote, in the next day,

Just to show you that was nothing written yesterday,

And u was blind...

I could write the many things i like to do,

In quick phrases, to satisfy ur curiousity, today,

But later, i will erase all the words i wrote you,

And all u'll see will be a clear background, grey...

I could write a lot of words, describing myself,

Just to show how interesting person i can be,

But right after that i won't say anything,

And i will leave and let u solve that mistery...

I could write u a collection of books with my life,

Just to show the beauty of Life,

But right after that, i will burn those books,

Cos the complex words are nothing to me,

But only the simplest ones,

Full of truth, cold as ice,

Will be those musical tones,

That i always wish to hear,

So, then, these ones are written but not deleted;

These truths, now, were stated.

Th3Mirr0r

I STILL THINK OF YOU, JOY MARIE..

I still think of you, my dearest one from all my Friends, Joy Marie,
A live remembrance of a woman loved, from my past,
Wide alike sky, deep alike sea,
Filling my eyes with its light...
May the years change around us, and one day, being old,
To remember the honest words, in our letters, told,
We'll be somewhere on a bench, smiling,
Hearing the wind's calling..
Alike a flute sound, the leafs in their hum, make noise,
Falling slowly, slowly, down...
It wasnt their choice,
To be there, on the ground;
Was the nature's way and law
Who brought in the autumne's rainy clouds,
The 7 colors of rainbow
And the rain stoped those days..
I will still remember u, my dear Friend, Joy Marie,
As with the same eyes to look at u,
Wishing, curious alike a baby, to see,
If the prayer to our Lord, for u,
Brought happiness and peace,
In ur life..
I still think of you, Joy Marie,
Alike in past, day by day,
Wishing to be near you,
To hold you,
To whisper these words:
'I love you, Joy Marie, my dearest Friend,
I wish to be with you, as much you do'...
I will be on a bench, when, old, watching the sky,
Remembering my past, i will smile,
I will find again the happiness,
Before i die..
Meanwhile,
I will live my life as it is...
So wonderfull is the life when u love! ! !
I reach to sigh, looking to the sky above,
Thinking when will be that moment when i'll close my eyes..
I will see then, a Friend from my past, happy;
I will know then that my prayers were listened
And once again, i will smile...
I will join a new life, there, near my beloved waterfall...
Then, looking at the water, i will whisper a call;
The same flute sound,
Looking beyound, i will know something:
Peace that was found,
Again, from nothing...
But i will still think of you, Joy Marie...

poem dedicated to Joy Marie G.Solomon

Th3Mirr0r

ROMANIAN VERSION

Inca ma gandesc la tine, Joy Marie...

Inca ma gandesc la tine, cea mai draga dintre toti Prietenii mei, Joy Marie,
O vie amintire a unei femei iubite, din trecutul meu,
Larg precum cerul, adanc precum marea,
Umplandu-mi ochii cu lumina sa...
Fie ca anii sa se schimbe in jurul nostru, iar intr-o zi, fiind batran,
Sa-mi amintesc cuvintele sincere, in scrisorile noastre, spuse,
Vom fi undeva, pe o banca, zambind,
Ascultand chemarea vantului...
Precum un sunet de nai, frunzele in agitatia lor, sa faca zgomot,
Cazand usor, usor, jos...
Nu a fost alegerea lor,
Sa fie acolo, pe pamant;
A fost legea si felul de-a fi a naturii
Ce a adus in norii ploiosi ai toamnei,
Cele 7 culori de curcubeu
Si ploaia s-a oprit in acele zile..
Tot imi voi aduce aminte de tine, dragra mea Prietena, Joy Marie,
Precum cu aceeasi ochi voi privi la tine,
Vrand, curios precum un prunc, sa vad,
Daca rugaciunea catre Domnul nostru, pentru tine,
A adus pace si fericire,
In viata ta...
Inca ma gandesc la tine, Joy Marie,
Precum in trecut, zi de zi,
Dorind sa fiu langa tine,
Sa te tin,
Sa-ti soptesc aceste cuvinte:
'Te iubesc, Joy Marie, draga mea Prietena,
Vreau sa fiu cu tine, precum vrei si tu'...
O sa fiu pe o banca, cand, batran, privind cerul,
Amintindu-mi trecutul meu, voi zambi,
O sa gasesc din nou fericirea,
Inainte de-a muri...
Intre timp
O sa-mi traiesc viata asa cum este...
Ce minunata este viata atunci cand iubesti! ! !
Ajung sa oftez, privind la cer, deasupra,
Cugentand la momentul cand imi voi inchide ochii...
Imi voi vedea apoi o Prietena, din trecut, fericita;
O sa stiu atunci ca rugaciunile mi-au fost ascultate
Si inca o data, voi zambi...
Voi urma o alta viata, acolo, langa cascada mea iubita...
Apoi, uitandu-ma la apa, o sa soptesc o chemare;
Acelasi sunet de nai,
Privind dincolo de el, voi sti ceva:
Pacea ce a fost gasita,
Din nou, din nimic...
Dar inca ma voi gandi la tine, Joy Marie...

Poem dedicat pentru Joy Marie G. Solomon

Th3Mirr0r

THE ROSE & THE PRINCESS

Look at me
With your eyes, full of honesty
And i will turn the color of my petals in white;
Look at me
With your eyes, full of love
And i will turn the color of my petals in red;
Look at me
With your mind
And i will show you the little drops of water,
Flowing down, slowly, among my petals, white,
Look at me
With your heart
And i will show you the little sparks of fire,
Rising up, fast, among my petals, red...

Sweet hands holding me tight at her chest,
White,
The thorns, stungs her left breast
And a small dropp of blood flows,
Red,
Followed by another,
Again, and again,
Alike a spring who arised now from a mountain..
She looks at her wound and once with her eyes,
Silver,
Once with my leafs, green, alike jade,
My petals turn to red..
The little drops of blood covered my petals..
Her silver eyes let falling down, in rivers,
Of tears, a waterfall...

Hold me tight near your heart,
Princess;
Let your tears fall down, slowly,
On my petals..
Hold me close to your lips,
Princess;
Let my fragrance surround you in a silent kiss
And you'll find then soothe, kissing my petals...
Ah, may your wound provoked by my thorns
Be covered by my robe!
Dressed in white with red, you will be,
In Harmony, princess!
May the nightingale sing for u her lovelly thrills
And from your eyes, those tears,
Honest, full of love and peace,
Crystals and diamonds, may them be!
And i will turn the color of my petals in white,
When your honest eyes, will look at me;
And i will turn the color of my petals in red,
When with love, you'll hold me;
And i will show you the little drops of water,
Flowing from the spring of ur heart,
Alike from a fountain who never drains..
And i will show you the little sparks of fire,
Rising up from your eyes,
Alike the morning's star, who never dies...

Th3Mirr0r

ROMANIAN VERSION

Trandafirul si Printesa

Priveste la mine
Cu ochii tai, plini de onestitate
Si-mi voi schimba culoarea petalelor mele in alb;
Priveste la mine, plina de iubire
Si-mi voi schimba culoarea petalelor mele in rosu;
Priveste la mine
Cu mintea ta
Si-ti voi arata micile picaturi de apa,
Curgand jos, domol, printre petalele mele, albe,
Priveste la mine
Cu inima ta
Si-ti voi arata micile scantei ale focului,
Ridicandu-se sus, rapid, printre petalele mele, rosii...

Maini dragute tinandu-ma strans la pieptul ei,
Alb,
Spinii, intepara sanul ei stang
Si o picatura de sange curge,
Rosu,
Urmata de o alta,
Iar, si iar,
Precum un izvor ce rasarise din munte...
Ea se uita la rana sa si o data cu ochii ei,
Argintii,
O data cu frunzele mele, verzi, precum jadul,
Petalele mele se schimba in rosu..
Micile picaturi de sange mi-au acoperit petalele..
Ochii ei argintii au lasat sa cada jos, in siroaie,
De lacrimi, o cascada...

Tine-ma strans langa inima ta,
Printesa;
Lasa-ti lacrimile sa cada jos, usor,
Deasupra petalelor mele...
Tine-ma aproape de buzele tale,
Printesa;
Lasa-mi parfumul sa te inconjoare intr-un sarut in tacere
Si vei gasi atunci alinare, sarutandu-mi petalele...
Ah, fie ca rana provocata de spinii mei
Sa fie acoperita de mantia mea!
Imbracata in rosu si alb, vei fi,
In Armonie, printesa!
Fie ca privighetoarea sa cante pentru tine cantecele sale incantatoare
Iar din ochii tai, acele lacrimi,
Sincere, pline de dragoste si pace,
Cristale si diamante, fi-vor ele!
Si o sa-mi schimb culoarea petalelor mele in alb,
Cand ochii tai sinceri vor privi la mine;
Si o sa-mi schimb culoarea petalelor mele in rosu,
Cand cu dragoste, ma vei tine;
Si-ti voi arata micile picaturi de apa,
Curgand din izvorul inimii tale,
Precum o fantana ce nu seaca niciodata..
Si-ti voi arata micile scantei de foc,
Rasarind din ochii tai,
Precum steaua diminetii, ce niciodata nu moare...

Th3Mirr0r

P.S:
ART & POETRY Project:
Check my website to find out more: www.th3mirr0r.ismywebsite.com. Is a site of ART; wonderfull! ! ! poetry, prose, graphic, animation and music!

Th3Mirr0r

PASSED AWAY THE YEARS...

Passed way the years...
I was little child,
Then, young,
Now...i am old...
I was a small blade of grass
Growing up on a meadow
But now, ...i must fall...
I will born again...
A new blade of grass, little,
I will rise in the same place,
Then, i must fall...
I will be then a fir
And when the time will come,
I will cheer up again someone's soul,
On Xmas, i will be there, in its home, ...
On my top it will place a star...
From my branches will make its chaplet
And i, always,
Alike a living Spirit, i will exist...
The sorrow i'll change
To someone, with happiness;
A he or a she, will reach to know,
Then, the Happiness...
Happiness of a child,
Who became over the yeas, a young;
Passed away my years,
Now, i am old...
Passed away the years when i was playing in the sand,
There, near my beloved sea;
I had a castle, wonderfull, who...in time,
Price of a second, it was,
In the next one, vanishing,
Swallowed, into sea's water...
'Why you build castle near sea's water, child?
Its waves will took ur castle away, u know that well enough! '
'Oh, yeah...i know, but don't forget something:
The sand appertains to the sea...
How i will take something that isn't myne? !
Who will wanna take something, who doesn't belong to it? !
Do you see well, the righteous answer, to your question? ! '
Passed away years, now
And still there i am, near sea...
I make another castle who won't last...
But the magic of that second
In which, with a smile, i will look it,
Will last...my entire life...
Last even now, when..being old,
I tell my remembrance...
I look at you, very well knowing
That you'll smile...price of a second,
In ur smile,
I would have found...
Happiness..
Oh, passwed away my years, alike the desert's sand
Cos, came the storms, moved the dunes,
The oasis full of life yet remained,
There, somewhere, secluded...
And the thirsty ones, found their peace...
They were walking through desert, straying,
Searching for a place of rest,
To defend themselves of the strong sun,
Who, from their journey, stopping them...
From time to time, they noticing the oasis,
Running to get to it...
But there, there wasn't anything..but the mirage...
Weaken there minds were! ! ...
Conclusion would have been, now:
They walked on a road of knowledge,
But only the sand's inhabitants
Know the secret of dunes...
Passed away my years...
But there remained

something...remembrance...

Th3Mirr0r

ROMANIAN VERSION

TRECUT-AU ANII...

Anii au trecut...
Eram mic copil,
Apoi tanar,
Acum, sunt batran...
Eram un fir de iarba
Crescand pe o pajiste
Acum, tre' sa cad...
Un nou fir de iarba, micut,
Voi creste in acelasi loc,
Apoi, tre' sa cad...
Voi fi apoi un brad
Iar cand timpul va veni,
Voi imbucura iar sufletul cuiva,
De Craciun, voi fi acolo, in casa sa, ...
In varful meu imi va aseza o stea...
Din ramurelele mele-si va face cununa
Iar eu, intotdeauna,
Ca Spirit viu, voi exista...
Tristetea-i voi schimba
Cuiva, cu bucurie;
Un el sau o ea, va sa stie,
Atunci, Fericirea...
Fericirea unui copil,
Devenit peste ani, un tanar;
Trecut-au anii mei,
Acum, sunt batran...
Trect-au anii cand ma jucam in nisip,
Acolo, langa iubita-mi mare;
Aveam un castel, minunat, ce...in timp,
Pret de-o secunda, era,
In urmatoarea, disparea,
Inghitit, in apele marii...
'De ce-ti faci castel langa apa marii, copile?
Valurile ti-l vor lua, stii bine! '
'Ah, da, ...stiu, dar nu uita ceva:
Nisipul, apartine marii...
Cum voi putea lua ceva ce nu-i al meu? !
Cine va putea lua ceva ce nu-i al sau? !
Deci, vezi tu, oare, un adevar, in spusele mele? !
Vezi tu oare, raspunsul drept, al intrebarii tale? ! '
Trecut-au anii, acum
Si tot acolo sunt, langa mare...
Imi fac un alt castel ce nu va dura...
Dar magia acelei secunde
In care, cu un zambet, il voi privi,
Va dura...toata viata mea...
Dureaza si acum, cand...batran fiind,
Imi spun amintirea...
Ma uit la tine, foarte bine stiind
Ca vei zambi...pret de-o secunda,
In zambetul tau...
Aflavo-mi eu...
Fericirea...
Ah, trect-au anii mei, precum nisipul desertului,
Caci venit-au furtunile, mutara dunele,
Oaza plina de viata inca ramase,
Acolo, undeva, retrasa...
Iar cei insetati, si-au gasit linistea...
Mergeau prin desert, ratacind,
Cautand sa se odihneasca,
Sa se apere de soarele puternic,
Ce din drum ii oprea...
Din cand in cand, observau oaza,
Alergau..sa ajunga la ea.....
Dar acolo, nu era nimic...decat mirajul...
Slabita le mai era mintea! ! !
Concluzia ar fi fost, acum:
Mersera ei pe drumul cunoasterii,
Dar numai locuitorii nisipurilor
Cunosc secretele dunelor...
Trecut-au anii mei...
Ramase ceva...amintirea...

Th3Mirr0r

THE MORNING AFTER

Around, silence..
In silence, a shadow..
The shadow, a woman,
She stays there, on a bench, crying..

A lack of confidence..
Confidence lost..cos there, in the meadow,
Finds a peace, her man;
He is there, in her arms, slowly, slowly, dying...

Destiny..
Sometimes, has its own actions..
Irreversible situations,
Alike when now, one is healthy
And then..sudden..dies..
But his woman, stays there, near her man,
Remembers the beautifull moments before they were gone
And..cries...

She remembers that one day before
He was smiling back to her so full of life!
But now, the merry moments are no more..
Sudden, in a morning after, gone, because of a strife...
A strife seen in a casual death chain
Cos her man
Struggles to live..
He has no will, to leave..

'I wish to lie down on the grass, my wife'
He whispers, slowly, bearly breathing
And the teary eyes of his woman,
Looks at him, alike begging to remain alive..
She drags him off the bench, there, on the grass,
Holds him dearly in her arms,
And her silky hair covers his face,
Alike the night covers the stars..
She close her eyes wishing again to feel

the other soul,
To give it life,
To split her life..
'Stay with me..
Do not leave me..'
She says him, among tears, flowing in a river
And her body, shiver,
When pressing her lips
In a silent life-kiss,
Of a morning after...
He's breathing normal now;
The heart-attack stopped;
The supply of blood and oxygen to an area of heart muscle is un-blocked,
And lives..
All because of God's will
To make happy a loving wife,
Changing hand of fate,
In a morning after...

Th3Mirr0r

ROMANIAN VERSION

DIMINEATA DE DUPA

Imprejur, liniste..
In liniste, o umbra..
Umbra, o femeie,
Ea sta acolo, pe o banca, plangand..

O lipsa a increderii..
Incredere pierduta..caci acolo, pe pajiste,
Isi gaseste o pace, barbatul ei;
El e acolo, in bratele ei, incet, incet, murind...

Destin..
Uneori, are propriile-i sale actiuni..
Situatii ireversibile,
Precum acum, cand cineva e sanatos
Iar apoi..deodata..moare..
Dar femeia sa, sta acolo, langa barbatul ei,
Isi aminteste momentele frumoase inainte ca ele sa dispara
Si..plange...

Ea-si aminteste ca in urma cu o zi
El ii returna zambetul asa de plin de viata!
Dar acum, momentele vesele nu mai sunt..
Deodata, intr-o dimineata de dupa, disparute, din cauza unui conflict...
Un conflict vazut intr-un lant intamplator al mortii
Caci barbatul ei
Se chinuie sa traiasca..
El nu are nici o vointa, sa plece..

'Doresc sa ma intind jos pe iarba, sotia mea'
Sopteste el, incet, abia respirand
Iar ochii inlacrimati ai femeii sale,
Privesc catre el, ca si cum ar implora sa

ramana in viata..
Ea-l trage jos de pe banca, acolo, pe iarba,
Il tine dragostos in brate,
Iar parul ei matasos ii acopera fata,
Precum noaptea acopera stelele..
Ea-si inchide ochii vrand din nou sa simta

celalalt suflet,
Sa-i dea viata,
Sa-mi imparta viata proprie..
'Stai cu mine..
Nu ma parasi..'
Ii spune ea, printre lacrimi, curgand intr-un rau,
Iar corpul, ii tremura,
Cand isi apasa buzele sale
Intr-un tacut sarut al vietii,
Al unei dimineti de dupa...
El respira normal acum;
Atacul de inima s-a oprit;
Cantitatea de sange si oxigen dintr-o zona

a unui muschi al inimii este deblocata,
Iar el, traieste..
Toate acestea datorita vointei lui Dumnezeu
De a face fericita o sotie iubitoare,
Schimband mana destinului,
Intr-o dimineata de dupa...

Th3Mirr0r

P.S:
ART & POETRY Project:
Check my website to find out more:

www.th3mirr0r.ismywebsite.com. Is a site of

ART; wonderfull! ! ! poetry, prose, graphic, animation and music!

Th3Mirr0r

i wished to share here some of my poems i wrote in past; thank u for reading

"The Infinite"

I always love this hill by itself
and this line of bushes that hides
so much of the farthest horizon from sight.
But sitting looking out I imagine spaces
beyond this one, each without end,
and silences more than human, and a stillness
under it all, until my heart is drawn
to the edge of fear. And when the wind
rustles through the undergrowth near me
endlessly I compare its voice
with the infinite silence. I remember eternity
and the ages dead, and the present
alive, and the sound of it. So in this
immensity my thinking drowns
and sinking is sweet to me in this sea.
- Giacomo Leopardi

Thank you for posting this, Jay. I love it.

That's exactly what I was thinking! Coming Out of the Ice is the most important book I've ever read in my life.

I don't know the author of this, can't remember where or when I heard it, but it has been in my heart most of my life.

Since my house burned down
I now have a better view
Of the rising moon.

This is another one which I memorized:

321. The Castaway

William Cowper (1731–1800)


OBSCUREST night involved the sky,
The Atlantic billows roared,
When such a destined wretch as I,
Washed headlong from on board,
Of friends, of hope, of all bereft, 5
His floating home for ever left.

No braver chief could Albion boast
Than he with whom he went,
Nor ever ship left Albion’s coast
With warmer wishes sent. 10
He loved them both, but both in vain,
Nor him beheld, nor her again.

Not long beneath the whelming brine,
Expert to swim, he lay;
Nor soon he felt his strength decline, 15
Or courage die away;
But waged with death a lasting strife,
Supported by despair of life.

He shouted: nor his friends had failed
To check the vessel’s course, 20
But so the furious blast prevailed
That, pitiless perforce,
They left their outcast mate behind,
And scudded still before the wind.

Some succour yet they could afford; 25
And such as storms allow,
The cask, the coop, the floated cord,
Delayed not to bestow.
But he (they knew) nor ship nor shore,
Whate’er they gave, should visit more. 30

Nor, cruel as it seemed, could he
Their haste himself condemn,
Aware that flight, in such a sea,
Alone could rescue them;
Yet bitter felt it still to die 35
Deserted, and his friends so nigh.

He long survives, who lives an hour
In ocean, self-upheld;
And so long he, with unspent power,
His destiny repelled; 40
And ever, as the minutes flew,
Entreated help, or cried ‘Adieu!’

At length, his transient respite past,
His comrades, who before
Had heard his voice in every blast, 45
Could catch the sound no more:
For then, by toil subdued, he drank
The stifling wave, and then he sank.

No poet wept him; but the page
Of narrative sincere, 50
That tells his name, his worth, his age
Is wet with Anson’s tear:
And tears by bards or heroes shed
Alike immortalize the dead.

I therefore purpose not, or dream, 55
Descanting on his fate,
To give the melancholy theme
A more enduring date:
But misery still delights to trace
Its semblance in another’s case. 60

No voice divine the storm allayed,
No light propitious shone,
When, snatched from all effectual aid,
We perished, each alone:
But I beneath a rougher sea, 65
And whelmed in deeper gulfs than he.

Musical Instrument
by Luis Cernuda
translated by Stephen Kessler

If the Arab musician
Plucks the lute strings
With an eagle quill
To awaken the notes,

What hand plucks
With what bird's quill
The wound in you
That awakens the word?

The Bluebell Wood by Felix Dennis

We walked within an ancient wood
Beside the Heart-of-England way
Where oak and beech and hazel stood,
Their leaves the pale shades of May.

By bole and bough, still black with rain,
The sunlight filtered where it would
Across a glowing, radiant stain -
We stood within a bluebell wood!

And stood and stood, both lost for words,
As all around the woodland rang
and echoed with the cries of birds
Who sang and sang and sang and sang...

My mind has marked that afternoon
To hoard against life's stone and sling;
Should I go late, or I go soon,
The bluebells glow - the birds still sing.

This poem reminds me of my Mum who at the age of 87 finally got her wish of walking in a bluebell wood.

The lowest trees have tops, the ant her gall,
The fly her spleen, the little spark his heat,
And slender hairs cast shadows though but small,
And bees have stings although they be not great.
Seas have their source, and so have shallow springs,
And love is love in beggars and in kings.

Where waters smoothest run, deep are the fords,
The dial stirs, yet none perceives it move:
The firmest faith is in the fewest words,
The turtles cannot sing, and yet they love,
True hearts have eyes and ears no tongues to speak:
They hear, and see, and sigh, and then they break.

Sir Edward Dyer 1540-1607

I remember this poem leaping out at me from the New Oxford Book of English Verse. So many long poems in that section and this one always seemed so simple and perfect in contrast.

Hoping to revive the thread. I'm a massive fan of Thomas Moore (the Irish poet, not More. the Tudor lawyer). I've been reading a lot of his poems lately - here's one of the best known and, IMO, probably the most romantic poem ever written. The back story (possibly apocryphal) for anyone who doesn't know it is that Moore's wife had had smallpox and been one of the lucky ones who survived. However, she was left facially scarred and shut herself away in her room, refusing to see anyone, especially her husband, who she could not believe would still love her now her looks had gone. Moore went away, wrote this song and sat outside her door to sing it. I think we can guess the response.

Believe me, if all those endearing young charms,
Which I gaze on so fondly to-day,
Were to change by to-morrow, and fleet in my arms,
Live fairy-gifts fading away,
Thou wouldst still be adored, as this moment thou art,
Let thy loveliness fade as it will,
And around the dear ruin each wish of my heart
Would entwine itself verdantly still.

It is not while beauty and youth are thine own,
And thy cheeks unprofaned by a tear,
That the fervor and faith of a soul may be known,
To which time will but make thee more dear!
No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets,
But as truly loves on to the close,
As the sunflower turns on her god when he sets
The same look which she turned when he rose!

And, though I love the emotional impact of that one, here's another in much lighter vein that is also a big favourite:

I've oft been told by learned friars,
That wishing and the crime are one,
And Heaven punishes desires
As much as if the deed were done.

If wishing damns us, you and I
Are damned to all our heart's content;
Come, then, at least we may enjoy
Some pleasure for our punishment!

The only Thomas Moore poem I have committed to memory:

Oft, in the Stilly Night

Oft, in the stilly night,
Ere slumber's chain has bound me,
Fond memory brings the light
Of other days around me;
The smiles, the tears,
Of boyhood's years,
The words of love then spoken;
The eyes that shone,
Now dimm'd and gone,
The cheerful hearts now broken!
Thus, in the stilly night,
Ere slumber's chain hath bound me,
Sad memory brings the light
Of other days around me.

When I remember all
The friends, so link'd together,
I've seen around me fall,
Like leaves in wintry weather;
I feel like one
Who treads alone
Some banquet-hall deserted,
Whose lights are fled,
Whose garlands dead,
And all but he departed!
Thus, in the stilly night,
Ere slumber's chain has bound me,
Sad memory brings the light
Of other days around me

i am now at an age where these words speak powerfully to me.

#125 He does have something for everyone!

I have trouble picking a single favorite poem, but this is certainly one I love. And short enough to quickly type out. It is one of Wendell Berry's Sabbath Poems, number II from 1999. From his collection Given.

I dream of a quiet man
who explains nothing and defends
nothing, but only knows
where the rarest wildflowers
are blooming, and who goes,
and finds that he is smiling
not by his own will.

From 'The Stolen Child' by W.B.Yeats:

Come away, O human child,
to the waters and the wild,
with a fairy, hand in hand.
For the world's more full of weeping
than you can understand.

(The poem as a whole is not my favourite, but these few lines are near perfection)

Well,
If we are going to resurect a thread, may I offer one of my favourite poets Pablo Neruda.

A bit of whimsy:
.......................

Ode to the Artichoke
(If translators can dedicate translations,
this one is dedicated to the memory of Lenny Leff.)


The artichoke
With a tender heart
Dressed up like a warrior,
Standing at attention, it built
A small helmet
Under its scales
It remained
Unshakeable,
By its side
The crazy vegetables
Uncurled
Their tendrills and leaf-crowns,
Throbbing bulbs,
In the sub-soil
The carrot
With its red mustaches
Was sleeping,
The grapevine
Hung out to dry its branches
Through which the wine will rise,
The cabbage
Dedicated itself
To trying on skirts,
The oregano
To perfuming the world,
And the sweet
Artichoke
There in the garden,
Dressed like a warrior,
Burnished
Like a proud
Pomegrante.
And one day
Side by side
In big wicker baskets
Walking through the market
To realize their dream
The artichoke army
In formation.
Never was it so military
Like on parade.
The men
In their white shirts
Among the vegetables
Were
The Marshals
Of the artichokes
Lines in close order
Command voices,
And the bang
Of a falling box.

But
Then
Maria
Comes
With her basket
She chooses
An artichoke,
She's not afraid of it.
She examines it, she observes it
Up against the light like it was an egg,
She buys it,
She mixes it up
In her handbag
With a pair of shoes
With a cabbage head and a
Bottle
Of vinegar
Until
She enters the kitchen
And submerges it in a pot.

Thus ends
In peace
This career
Of the armed vegetable
Which is called an artichoke,
Then
Scale by scale,
We strip off
The delicacy
And eat
The peaceful mush
Of its green heart.

.........................

Err...Yes?

Guido.

>120 Schmerguls: Thanks, Guido - Great translation! - maybe Marvell's famous vegetable love was something like that?

I was looking for something else last night and came across a splendid little poem that really fits this time of year very nicely, Dannie Abse's "Chocolate Box". I was tempted to post it here, but as Dr Abse is happily still around and still publishing, I won't. It's in his collection On the evening road.

It would be difficult to name a single favourite poem, but this would be near the top:

From Blank to Blank -
A Threadless Way
I pushed Mechanic Feet -
To stop - or perish - or advance -
Alike indifferent -

If end I gained
It ends beyond
Indefinite disclosed -
I shut my eyes - and groped as well
'Twas lighter - to be Blind -

Emily Dickinson

Thanks, #131,
I am rather fond of "Emily Dickinson", but not
every day :-)

#130, Please tell me more about 'Marvel' and
his LUV of vegetables? I know nothing...

Guido.

There was an old lady of chertsey

Who made a remarkable chertsey

She twirled round and round

Till she sunk underground

Which distressed all the people of chertsey

Here is the winner of 'Australian Poetry' magazine's poem of the week 4-9 October 2012, by Elizabeth Claire Alberts:

ANOTHER LANGUAGE

As you laid dying
on bleached cotton sheets
over that plastic mattress bed
you began to speak another language,
throaty groans and sonorant sighs
that made us lean close to listen,
ciphering your sounds
into rudimentary wants:
sit up, water, broth, blanket.

But it was your hands
that seemed to speak more fluently,
your fingers rendering the air
as if you practiced the signs
of some new linguistic code
only you could see and hear.

When you lifted your hands high
we rushed to your sides
to squeeze warmth into your palms;

sometimes you grasped back,
sometimes you slipped your hands away.

>130 thorold:, 132 Andrew Marvell — he was the other famous poet from Hull, a man who seems to have been aware of the possibilities of sexual intercourse well before 1963. I believe a certain amount of ink has been spilt over the years in attempts to decide what vegetable he meant.

To his Coy Mistress

by Andrew Marvell

Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk, and pass our long love's day;
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood;
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast,
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart.
For, lady, you deserve this state,
Nor would I love at lower rate.

But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song; then worms shall try
That long preserv'd virginity,
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust.
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace.

Now therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may;
And now, like am'rous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour,
Than languish in his slow-chapp'd power.
Let us roll all our strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one ball;
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Thorough the iron gates of life.
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.

135> last theory I read was the sweet potato, I think it is important to note that at the time "Vegetable" implied not inactive but rather alive, growing.

I guess it probably depends on whether you read it as "my vegetable-love would grow" or "my vegetable, love, would grow". Quite creepy either way.

Yes, and if you read it very literally, you could conclude that the unfortunate woman is being offered a choice of being penetrated by a vegetable, a worm, or a boiled sweet. I suppose we should be grateful that he doesn't mention The Land of Green Ginger...

"TO MAKE AN AMBLONGUS PIE.

Take 4 pounds (say 4-1/2 pounds) of fresh Amblongusses, and put them in a small pipkin.

Cover them with water, and boil them for 8 hours incessantly; after which add 2 pints of new milk, and proceed to boil for 4 hours more.

When you have ascertained that the Amblongusses are quite soft, take them out, and place them in a wide pan, taking care to shake them well previously.

Grate some nutmeg over the surface, and cover them carefully with powdered gingerbread, curry-powder, and a sufficient quantity of Cayenne pepper.

Remove the pan into the next room, and place it on the floor. Bring it back again, and let it simmer for three-quarters of an hour. Shake the pan violently till all the Amblongusses have become of a pale purple color.

Then, having prepared the paste, insert the whole carefully; adding at the same time a small pigeon, 2 slices of beef, 4 cauliflowers, and any number of oysters.

Watch patiently till the crust begins to rise, and add a pinch of salt from time to time.

Serve up in a clean dish, and throw the whole out of window as fast as possible."

-Edward Lear

Lear should always be taken with a pinch of salt.

Cheese goes well with Lear.

Re #135, I always have to smile when I recall the famed lines:

The grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace.