Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Edgar Allen Poe (1809-1849)



The Sleeper
.
At midnight, in the month of June,
I stand beneath the mystic moon.
An opiate vapor, dewy, dim,
Exhales from out her golden rim,
And, softly dripping, drop by drop,
Upon the quiet mountain top,
Steals drowsily and musically
Into the universal valley.
The rosemary nods upon the grave;
The lily lolls upon the wave;
Wrapping the fog about its breast,
The ruin molders into rest;
Looking like Lethe, see! the lake
A conscious slumber seems to take,
And would not, for the world, awake.
All Beauty sleeps!- and lo! where lies
Irene, with her Destinies!

O, lady bright! can it be right-
This window open to the night?
The wanton airs, from the tree-top,
Laughingly through the lattice drop-
The bodiless airs, a wizard rout,
Flit through thy chamber in and out,
And wave the curtain canopy
So fitfully- so fearfully-
Above the closed and fringed lid
'Neath which thy slumb'ring soul lies hid,
That, o'er the floor and down the wall,
Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall!
Oh, lady dear, hast thou no fear?
Why and what art thou dreaming here?
Sure thou art come O'er far-off seas,
A wonder to these garden trees!
Strange is thy pallor! strange thy dress,
Strange, above all, thy length of tress,
And this all solemn silentness!

The lady sleeps! Oh, may her sleep,
Which is enduring, so be deep!
Heaven have her in its sacred keep!
This chamber changed for one more holy,
This bed for one more melancholy,
I pray to God that she may lie
For ever with unopened eye,
While the pale sheeted ghosts go by!

My love, she sleeps! Oh, may her sleep
As it is lasting, so be deep!
Soft may the worms about her creep!
Far in the forest, dim and old,
For her may some tall vault unfold-
Some vault that oft has flung its black
And winged panels fluttering back,
Triumphant, o'er the crested palls,
Of her grand family funerals-
Some sepulchre, remote, alone,
Against whose portal she hath thrown,
In childhood, many an idle stone-
Some tomb from out whose sounding door
She ne'er shall force an echo more,
Thrilling to think, poor child of sin!
It was the dead who groaned within.

Monday, January 30, 2012

Charles Bukowski (1920-1994)


Are You Drinking?
.
washed-up, on shore, the old yellow notebook
out again
I write from the bed
as I did last
year.
will see the doctor,
Monday.
"yes, doctor, weak legs, vertigo, head-
aches and my back
hurts."
"are you drinking?" he will ask.
"are you getting your
exercise, your
vitamins?"
I think that I am just ill
with life, the same stale yet
fluctuating
factors.
even at the track
I watch the horses run by
and it seems
meaningless.
I leave early after buying tickets on the
remaining races.
"taking off?" asks the motel
clerk.
"yes, it's boring,"
I tell him.
"If you think it's boring
out there," he tells me, "you oughta be
back here."
so here I am
propped up against my pillows
again
just an old guy
just an old writer
with a yellow
notebook.
something is
walking across the
floor
toward
me.
oh, it's just
my cat
this
time.

Charles Bukowski


Sunday, January 29, 2012

Jack Kerouac (1922-1969)


Bowery Blues
.
The story of man
Makes me sick
Inside, outside,
I don't know why
Something so conditional
And all talk
Should hurt me so.

I am hurt
I am scared
I want to live
I want to die
I don't know
Where to turn
In the Void
And when
To cut
Out

For no Church told me
No Guru holds me
No advice
Just stone
Of New York
And on the cafeteria
We hear
The saxophone
O dead Ruby
Died of Shot
In Thirty Two,
Sounding like old times
And de bombed
Empty decapitated
Murder by the clock.

And I see Shadows
Dancing into Doom
In love, holding
TIght the lovely asses
Of the little girls
In love with sex
Showing themselves
In white undergarments
At elevated windows
Hoping for the Worst.

I can't take it
Anymore
If I can't hold
My little behind
To me in my room

Then it's goodbye
Sangsara
For me
Besides
Girls aren't as good
As they look
And Samadhi
Is better
Than you think
When it starts in
Hitting your head
In with Buzz
Of glittergold
Heaven's Angels
Wailing

Saying

We've been waiting for you
Since Morning, Jack
Why were you so long
Dallying in the sooty room?
This transcendental Brilliance
Is the better part
(of Nothingness
I sing)

Okay.
Quit.
Mad.
Stop.


Thursday, January 26, 2012

Denise Low



Two Gates
By Denise Low
.
I look through glass and see a young woman
of twenty, washing dishes, and the window
turns into a painting. She is myself thirty years ago.
She holds the same blue bowls and brass teapot
I still own. I see her outline against lamplight;
she knows only her side of the pane. The porch
where I stand is empty. Sunlight fades. I hear
water run in the sink as she lowers her head,
blind to the future. She does not imagine I exist.

I step forward for a better look and she dissolves
into lumber and paint. A gate I passed through
to the next life loses shape. Once more I stand
squared into the present, among maple trees
and scissor-tailed birds, in a garden, almost
a mother to that faint, distant woman.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

St. John of the Cross (1542-1591)


MY SOUL IS A CANDLE


My soul is a candle that burned away the veil;
only the glorious duties of light I now have.



The sufferings I knew initiated me into God.

I am a holy confessor for men.



When I see their tears running across their cheeks
and falling into

His hands,


what can I say to their great sorrow
that I too have
known.



The soul is a candle that will burn away the darkness,
only the glorious duties of love we will have.



The sufferings I knew initiated me into God.

Only His glorious cares
I now have.

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1881)


IV

Thou hast thy calling to some palace-floor,
Most gracious singer of high poems! where
The dancers will break footing, from the care
Of watching up thy pregnant lips for more.
And dost thou lift this house's latch too poor
For hand of thine? and canst thou think and bear
To let thy music drop here unaware
In folds of golden fulness at my door?
Look up and see the casement broken in,
The bats and owlets builders in the roof!
My cricket chirps against thy mandolin.
Hush, call no echo up in further proof
Of desolation! there's a voice within
That weeps . . . as thou must sing . . . alone, aloof.

Monday, January 23, 2012

Miklos Radnoti (1900-1944)


War Diary


1. Monday Evening

You see, now fear often fingers your heart,
and at times the world seems only distant news;
the old trees guard your childhood for you
as an ever more ancient memory.


Between suspicious mornings and foreboding nights
you have lived half your life among wars,
and now once more, order is glinting toward you
on the raised points of bayonets.


In dreams sometimes the landscape still rises before you,
the home of your poetry, where the scent of freedom
wafts over the meadows, and in the morning when you wake,
you carry the scent with you.


Rarely, when you are working, you half-sit, frightened
at your desk. And it's as if you were living in soft mud;
your hand, adorned with a pen, moves heavily
and ever more gravely.


The world is turning into another war—a hungry cloud
gobbles the sky's mild blue, and as it darkens,
your young wife puts her arms around you,
and weeps.


Sunday, January 22, 2012

Patti Smith


THE FAMOUS EASTER ACT
stigmata susie
has the biggest feet in kansas city
call her sweet susie gunboats
feet as wide as ole lake erie

she's a landmark of america
call her purple spacious shoe susie
dances down the yosemite block dance
violet tap shoes from yosemite bay

that more than twice worn so tight
her feet bled for forty days
her feet bled for forty nights
ruined susies perfect arch


Saturday, January 21, 2012

Sylvia Plath (1932-1963)


Dark Wood, Dark Water
.
This wood burns a dark
Incense. Pale moss drips
In elbow-scarves, beards

From the archaic
Bones of the great trees.
Blue mists move over

A lake thick with fish.
Snails scroll the border
Of the glazed water

With coils of ram's-horn.
Out in the open
Down there the late year

Hammers her rare and
Various metals.
Old pewter roots twist

Up from the jet-backed
Mirror of water
And while the air's clear

Hourglass sifts a
Drift of goldpieces
Bright waterlights are

Sliding their quoits one
After the other
Down boles of the fir.

Friday, January 20, 2012

Pablo Neruda (1904-1973)


‘March days return with their covert light’
.
March days return with their covert light,
and huge fish swim through the sky,
vague earthly vapours progress in secret,
things slip to silence one by one.
Through fortuity, at this crisis of errant skies,
you reunite the lives of the sea to that of fire,
grey lurchings of the ship of winter
to the form that love carved in the guitar.
O love, O rose soaked by mermaids and spume,
dancing flame that climbs the invisible stairway,
to waken the blood in insomnia’s labyrinth,
so that the waves can complete themselves in the sky,
the sea forget its cargoes and rages,
and the world fall into darkness’s nets.

Pablo Neruda


Thursday, January 19, 2012

Charles Bukowski - (1930-1994)


What A Writer
.
what i liked about e.e. cummings
was that he cut away from
the holiness of the
word
and with charm
and gamble
gave us lines
that sliced through the
dung.

how it was needed!
how we were withering
away
in the old
tired
manner.

of course, then came all
the e.e. cummings
copyists.
they copied him then
as the others had
copied Keats, Shelly,
Swinburne, Byron, et
al.

but there was only
one
e.e. cummings.
of course.

one sun.

one moon.

Charles Bukowski

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Joseph Brodsky (1940-1996)


As you pour yourself a scotch,
crush a roach, or scratch your crotch,
as your hand adjusts your tie,
people die.
In the towns with funny names,
hit by bullets, caught in flames,
by and large not knowing why,
people die.
In small places you don't know
of, yet big for having no
chance to scream or say good-bye,
people die.
People die as you elect
brand-new dudes who preach neglect,
self-restraint, etc. –whereby
people die.
Too far off to practice love
for thy neighbor/brother Slav,
where your cherubs dread to fly,
people die.
While the statues disagree,
Cain's version, history
for its fuel tends to buy
those who die.
As you watch the athletes score,
check your latest statement, or
sing your child a lullaby,
people die.
Time, whose sharp bloodthirsty quill
parts the killed from those who kill,
will pronounce the latter band
as your brand.

Joseph Brodsky

Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Wislawa Szymborska


A Few Words On The Soul
.
We have a soul at times.
No one's got it non-stop,
for keeps.

Day after day,
year after year
may pass without it.

Sometimes
it will settle for awhile
only in childhood's fears and raptures.
Sometimes only in astonishment
that we are old.

It rarely lends a hand
in uphill tasks,
like moving furniture,
or lifting luggage,
or going miles in shoes that pinch.

It usually steps out
whenever meat needs chopping
or forms have to be filled.

For every thousand conversations
it participates in one,
if even that,
since it prefers silence.

Just when our body goes from ache to pain,
it slips off-duty.

It's picky:
it doesn't like seeing us in crowds,
our hustling for a dubious advantage
and creaky machinations make it sick.

Joy and sorrow
aren't two different feelings for it.
It attends us
only when the two are joined.

We can count on it
when we're sure of nothing
and curious about everything.

Among the material objects
it favors clocks with pendulums
and mirrors, which keep on working
even when no one is looking.

It won't say where it comes from
or when it's taking off again,
though it's clearly expecting such questions.

We need it
but apparently
it needs us
for some reason too.

Monday, January 16, 2012

Walter Savage Landor


Last Fruit Off an Old Tree,
by Walter Savage Landor
.
Death stands above me, whispering low
I know not what into my ear:
Of his strange language all I know
Is, there is not a word of fear.

Sunday, January 15, 2012

W.B. Yeats (1865-1939)


A FRIEND'S ILLNESS

SICKNESS brought me this
Thought, in that scale of his:
Why should I be dismayed
Though flame had burned the whole
World, as it were a coal,
Now I have seen it weighed
Against a soul?

Saturday, January 14, 2012

José Asunción Silva (1865-1896)


ARS POETICA

The poem is a sacred vessel. Place in it nothing
But the purest thoughts
In whose depths seethe fermenting images
Like golden bubbles in a fine old wine.

Empty into it the flowers that in their eternal cycle
Wrest the world from winter,
Distilling memories of time we cannot recapture
And tuberose dripping drops of dew,

So that our wretched lives may be made as sweet
As an unknown essence
Simmering in the fires of a tender heart:
Of such unequalled balm one drop is enough!

Friday, January 13, 2012

Miguel Hernandez (1910-1942)


‘It Would Have Been Less Painful’
(IX: From ‘El Rayo Que No Cesa’)

It would have been less painful if it had been
nard your complexion to my gaze, nard,
thistle your skin to my touch, thistle,
bitter-apple your voice to my ears, bitter.

Bitter-apple is your voice to my ears, bitter,
and I burn, in and around your voice, I burn,
and I’m slow to burn, what I’m slow to offer,
juniper oil, my voice for yours, juniper.

Briar is your hand, if I hold it, briar,
wave your body, if I reach for it, wave,
close to me once, yet a thousand times not close.

Heron is my pain, a slender sad heron,
alone like a breath and a cry, alone,
stubborn in its error and disgrace, stubborn.






Thursday, January 12, 2012

Gary Snyder


After Work
The shack and a few trees
float in the blowing fog

I pull out your blouse,
warm my cold hands
on your breasts.
you laugh and shudder
peeling garlic by the
hot iron stove.
bring in the axe, the rake,
the wood

we'll lean on the wall
against each other
stew simmering on the fire
as it grows dark
drinking wine.

Gary Snyder

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Tomas Transtromer


After a Death
by Tomas Tranströmer
translated by Robert Bly


Once there was a shock
that left behind a long, shimmering comet tail.
It keeps us inside. It makes the TV pictures snowy.
It settles in cold drops on the telephone wires.

One can still go slowly on skis in the winter sun
through brush where a few leaves hang on.
They resemble pages torn from old telephone directories.
Names swallowed by the cold.

It is still beautiful to hear the heart beat
but often the shadow seems more real than the body.
The samurai looks insignificant
beside his armor of black dragon scales.

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Juan Ramon Jimenez (1881-1958)




“I Am Not I”
By Juan Ramón Jiménez 1881–1958
Translated By Robert Bly

I am not I.
I am this one
walking beside me whom I do not see,
whom at times I manage to visit,
and whom at other times I forget;
who remains calm and silent while I talk,
and forgives, gently, when I hate,
who walks where I am not,
who will remain standing when I die.

Monday, January 9, 2012

Anonymous


to learn how to die
watch cherry blossoms, observe
chrysanthemums

Sunday, January 8, 2012

Mo Fei


WORDS AND OBJECTS

Prelude

In that place either silent or blind
You're writing the only poem.
In the backyard of time
you've written the lines to replace words and objects.

Before the destruction you started
the poem
which no one can kidnap,
which has no beginning.
It's approaching the winter.
The pen tip gleams.
The last stroke in the dark
brings the world to a sudden halt.

Those whose ears were stolen
will never forgive.
The disaster caused by the snow storm
awoke all the intoxicated.

A gardener who keeps death and roses
is trying to learn cool wisdom
with the short days of his life.
Doors and windows are tightly closed.
How you wish you could keep your relatives here
and let trees enjoy the silent twilight.

You're doomed
to write this only poem.
The breath of the blooming words is short--
you linger on.

translated by Wang Ping and Leonard Schwartz


Saturday, January 7, 2012

Steely Dan - Deacon Blues



Deacon Blues


This is the day
Of the expanding man
That shape is my shade
There where I used to stand
It seems like only yesterday
I gazed through the glass
At ramblers
Wild gamblers
That's all in the past

You call me a fool
You say it's a crazy scheme
This one's for real
I already bought the dream
So useless to ask me why
Throw a kiss and say goodbye
I'll make it this time
I'm ready to cross that fine line

CHORUS:
I'll learn to work the saxophone
I'll play just what I feel
Drink Scotch whisky all night long
And die behind the wheel
They got a name for the winners in the world
I want a name when I lose
They call Alabama the Crimson Tide
Call me Deacon Blues

My back to the wall
A victim of laughing chance
This is for me
The essence of true romance
Sharing the things we know and love
With those of my kind
Libations
Sensations
That stagger the mind

I crawl like a viper
Through these suburban streets
Make love to these women
Languid and bittersweet
I'll rise when the sun goes down
Cover every game in town
A world of my own
I'll make it my home sweet home

CHORUS

This is the night
Of the expanding the man
I take one last drag
As I approach the stand
I cried when I wrote this song
Sue me if I play too long
This brother is free
I'll be what I want to be

CHORUS


Friday, January 6, 2012

Wislawa Szymborska


A Few Words On The Soul
.
We have a soul at times.
No one's got it non-stop,
for keeps.

Day after day,
year after year
may pass without it.

Sometimes
it will settle for awhile
only in childhood's fears and raptures.
Sometimes only in astonishment
that we are old.

It rarely lends a hand
in uphill tasks,
like moving furniture,
or lifting luggage,
or going miles in shoes that pinch.

It usually steps out
whenever meat needs chopping
or forms have to be filled.

For every thousand conversations
it participates in one,
if even that,
since it prefers silence.

Just when our body goes from ache to pain,
it slips off-duty.

It's picky:
it doesn't like seeing us in crowds,
our hustling for a dubious advantage
and creaky machinations make it sick.

Joy and sorrow
aren't two different feelings for it.
It attends us
only when the two are joined.

We can count on it
when we're sure of nothing
and curious about everything.

Among the material objects
it favors clocks with pendulums
and mirrors, which keep on working
even when no one is looking.

It won't say where it comes from
or when it's taking off again,
though it's clearly expecting such questions.

We need it
but apparently
it needs us
for some reason too.

Thursday, January 5, 2012

MARIA DEL CARMEN PAIVA


LATER
.
After all have past;
from the initial rupture,
from the all-too-sad alterations
and from the visible abnegation
that reconciled me to the opposite of forgetfulness;
after that battle in which my belly burned
until they remained sculpted
in the image of my exhaustion
in the exuberant sky
of those days;
and later

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Charles Bukowski (1920-1994)


Are You Drinking?
.
washed-up, on shore, the old yellow notebook
out again
I write from the bed
as I did last
year.
will see the doctor,
Monday.
"yes, doctor, weak legs, vertigo, head-
aches and my back
hurts."
"are you drinking?" he will ask.
"are you getting your
exercise, your
vitamins?"
I think that I am just ill
with life, the same stale yet
fluctuating
factors.
even at the track
I watch the horses run by
and it seems
meaningless.
I leave early after buying tickets on the
remaining races.
"taking off?" asks the motel
clerk.
"yes, it's boring,"
I tell him.
"If you think it's boring
out there," he tells me, "you oughta be
back here."
so here I am
propped up against my pillows
again
just an old guy
just an old writer
with a yellow
notebook.
something is
walking across the
floor
toward
me.
oh, it's just
my cat
this
time.

Charles Bukowski

Tuesday, January 3, 2012

Theodore Roethke (1908-1963)


Night Journey
.
Now as the train bears west,
Its rhythm rocks the earth,
And from my Pullman berth
I stare into the night
While others take their rest.
Bridges of iron lace,
A suddenness of trees,
A lap of mountain mist
All cross my line of sight,
Then a bleak wasted place,
And a lake below my knees.
Full on my neck I feel
The straining at a curve;
My muscles move with steel,
I wake in every nerve.
I watch a beacon swing
From dark to blazing bright;
We thunder through ravines
And gullies washed with light.
Beyond the mountain pass
Mist deepens on the pane;
We rush into a rain
That rattles double glass.
Wheels shake the roadbed stone,
The pistons jerk and shove,
I stay up half the night
To see the land I love.

Monday, January 2, 2012

Elisabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861)


IV

Thou hast thy calling to some palace-floor,
Most gracious singer of high poems! where
The dancers will break footing, from the care
Of watching up thy pregnant lips for more.
And dost thou lift this house's latch too poor
For hand of thine? and canst thou think and bear
To let thy music drop here unaware
In folds of golden fulness at my door?
Look up and see the casement broken in,
The bats and owlets builders in the roof!
My cricket chirps against thy mandolin.
Hush, call no echo up in further proof
Of desolation! there's a voice within
That weeps . . . as thou must sing . . . alone, aloof.


Sunday, January 1, 2012

Dora de Boneo (1918-2001)


Dora de Boneo (1918 - 2001 ) Argentina
I Will Tell You Later
To my husband Martín Alberto Boneo 1975

I will tell you later
why the time hurts me so much
and why there is no turning back
to pay for my life.

And I do not know
Why the days pile up
And wait in a row.

Why do I want
To get out of me?
Tell me, my compañero

I call you
And I call you!
Without any response.
And everyone wants to convince me
that I have gone crazy.
As you are dead
and your name remains
for everyone in memory.
Yes, only in memory.

But I have memory.
I am not crazy.
And I know what I have
And what have I lost.
Yes, I meet you in my loneliness.
But you do not understand
That I know it so well,
You are not with meand are always with me.

Because when we lived
It was like living
Carrying our love
To the pain of burning fires!

That happened to blend our blood
when suddenly it was cold
and hardened in order
to set the bones in sites.
And to forget that I cried
even though you did not know it.

Later I will tell you
how are our children
and why I grumble all day long,
serving you a cup of coffee
reaching to your chair
and not understanding
why it is empty.

One morning I was sad
and I did not know why.

And I was happy
to the point of being pretty.
And up to my waist exceeded
the hands, the flowers
the perfume, the warmth
the agility and the engagements…

Still the darkness lasted
longer than the laughter,
and it cost me fulfilling my hopes….

Yes, I can still contemplate the sun
through your tears to mine.
You see, we shared the pain.

I urge you to listen to me,
though at a distant,
I wish you to know
who I am.

I do not regret that God suspects
I stole the key to what I have lost.

That I guarded this love!

And that a distracted angel,
By your death,
Unaccountably gave it to me.

The key to your alive image.
As he knew
The time was deceived.

And I dream like yesterday
What I am today.
That’s why it’s hard
For you to respond to me.
Of that I myself am not sure.

My voice will reach you, my friend.
You will listen me very closely.
I am going towards…
You and I will be together.