Q&A with Josh Lanyon discussion
JUST FOR FUN
>
Read Me a Poem Sing Me a Song
Johanna wrote: "What a lovely glimpse into happiness, Antonella."Yes, and I feel a bit like the poet at the moment: quietly happy for no big reason at all, just a general feeling deriving from several little things...
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Yes, and I feel a bit like the poet at the moment: quietly happy for no big reason at all, just a general feeling deriving from se..."
That's the best place to be, that feeling. I'm happy for you, my dear.
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Warm, or room temperature?
I have very sensitive teeth, especially to cold, so I eat all fruit at room temperature. It has more flavor t..."
Good point. Room temp.
Warm sounds a bit ghastly. :-D
Love After Love by Derek Walcott (1930-2017)The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other’s welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.
This short poem by the emperor Hadrian has always made me sad, but it is beautiful:Animula vagula blandula
by Publius Aelius Traianus Hadrianus
Animula vagula blandula
Hospes comesque corporis,
Quae nunc abibis in loca
Pallidula rigida nudula,
Nec, ut soles, dabis iocos…
Little soul, you charming little wanderer,
my body’s guest and partner,
Where are you off to now?
Somewhere without colour, savage and bare;
Never again to share a joke.
Translation found here, with other interesting information about Hadrian.
Here you can read 43 (!) translation of this same poem.
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Animula vagula blandula
by Publius Aelius Traianus Hadrianus
Animula vagula blandula
Hospes comesque corporis,..."
How intriguing — and sad. Thank you for sharing this and all the translations, Antonella.
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Pumpkins
At the end of the garden,
Across the litter of weeds and grass cuttings,
The pumpkin spreads its coarse,
Bristled, hollow-stemmed lines,
Erupting in great leaves
Above flowers
The nobbly and prominent
Stigmas of which
Are like fuses
Waiting to be set by bees.
When, like a string
Of yellow mines
Across the garden,
The pumpkins will smolder
And swell,
Drawing their combustion from the sun
To make their own.
At night I lie
Waiting for detonations,
Half expecting
To find the garden
Cratered like a moon.
(I believe the poet is John Cotton https://www.theguardian.com/news/2003... but not absolutely sure)
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Pumpkins
At the end of the garden,
Across the litter of weeds and grass cuttings,
The pumpkin spreads its coarse,
Bristled, hollow-stemmed lines,
Erupting in..."
That's lovely. Happy Halloween!
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I dwell in a lonely house I know
That vanished many a summer ago,
And left no trace but the cellar walls,
And a cellar in which the daylight falls
And the purple-stemmed wild raspberries grow.
O'er ruined fences the grape-vines shield
The woods come back to the mowing field;
The orchard tree has grown one copse
Of new wood and old where the woodpecker chops;
The footpath down to the well is healed.
I dwell with a strangely aching heart
In that vanished abode there far apart
On that disused and forgotten road
That has no dust-bath now for the toad.
Night comes; the black bats tumble and dart;
The whippoorwill is coming to shout
And hush and cluck and flutter about:
I hear him begin far enough away
Full many a time to say his say
Before he arrives to say it out.
It is under the small, dim, summer star.
I know not who these mute folk are
Who share the unlit place with me—
Those stones out under the low-limbed tree
Doubtless bear names that the mosses mar.
They are tireless folk, but slow and sad—
Though two, close-keeping, are lass and lad,—
With none among them that ever sings,
And yet, in view of how many things,
As sweet companions as might be had.
Robert Frost - 1874-1963
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YES.
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I dwell in a lonely house I know
That vanished many a summer ago,
And left no trace but the cellar walls,
And a cellar in which the daylight falls
And the purple-stemmed wild raspbe..."
This is soooo.... just... words are failing me right now, but I can see all of this in my mind. :-)
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Pumpkins
At the end of the garden,
Across the litter of weeds and grass cuttings,
The pumpkin spreads its coarse,
Bristled, hollow-stemmed lines,
Erupting in..."
I love this, especially how he sees shared attributes between pumpkins and explosives and lies awakes waiting for exploding pumpkins. :)
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Ef you
Don't
Watch
Out!
https://poets.org/poem/little-orphant...
I remember this one from the long lost book of poems I loved as a child. It’s a horrible story, but very catchy. ;)
Karen wrote: "An' the Gobble-uns'll git youEf you
Don't
Watch
Out!
https://poets.org/poem/little-orphant...
I remember this one from the long lost book of poems I loved as a child. It’s a horrible stor..."
I remember that one; it's great!
OK! here's one I remember from my own childhood book of poems. We had to memorize poems in eighth grade, and recite them aloud to the class, and this is one of the ones I picked (the other was Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost).I reread it just now and boy, is it terrible. Joyce Kilmer is really a very bad poet; I mean, I'm sorry he died so young and all, but he really is America's answer to William McGonagall.
The House With Nobody In It - by Joyce Kilmer
Whenever I walk to Suffern along the Erie track
I go by a poor old farmhouse with its shingles broken and black.
I suppose I've passed it a hundred times, but I always stop for a minute
And look at the house, the tragic house, the house with nobody in it.
I never have seen a haunted house, but I hear there are such things;
That they hold the talk of spirits, their mirth and sorrowings.
I know this house isn't haunted, and I wish it were, I do;
For it wouldn't be so lonely if it had a ghost or two.
This house on the road to Suffern needs a dozen panes of glass,
And somebody ought to weed the walk and take a scythe to the grass.
It needs new paint and shingles, and the vines should be trimmed and tied;
But what it needs the most of all is some people living inside.
If I had a lot of money and all my debts were paid
I'd put a gang of men to work with brush and saw and spade.
I'd buy that place and fix it up the way it used to be
And I'd find some people who wanted a home and give it to them free.
Now, a new house standing empty, with staring window and door,
Looks idle, perhaps, and foolish, like a hat on its block in the store.
But there's nothing mournful about it; it cannot be sad and lone
For the lack of something within it that it has never known.
But a house that has done what a house should do,
a house that has sheltered life,
That has put its loving wooden arms around a man and his wife,
A house that has echoed a baby's laugh and held up his stumbling feet,
Is the saddest sight, when it's left alone, that ever your eyes could meet.
So whenever I go to Suffern along the Erie track
I never go by the empty house without stopping and looking back,
Yet it hurts me to look at the crumbling roof and the shutters fallen apart,
For I can't help thinking the poor old house is a house with a broken heart.
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Ef you
Don't
Watch
Out!
https://poets.org/poem/little-orphant...
I remember this one from the long lost book of poems I loved as a child. It’s a horrible stor..."
oh my gosh!! I totally remember that!
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So gorgeously mawkish. :-D Poems to appeal to a simpler time, for sure.
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I'm following on the radio a solidarity event against hatred and anti-Semitism im Milano. 600 mayors and also ''normal'' people are attending. Liliana Segre, Auschwitz survivor and italian Senator for life, just quoted this poem (English underneath):Agli amici by Primo Levi
Cari amici, qui dico amici
Nel senso vasto della parola:
Moglie, sorella, sodali, parenti,
Compagne e compagni di scuola,
Persone viste una volta sola
O praticate per tutta la vita:
Purchè fra noi, per almeno un momento,
Sia stato teso un segmento,
Una corda ben definita.
Dico per voi, compagni d'un cammino
Folto, non privo di fatica,
E per voi pure, che avete perduto
L'anima, l'animo, la voglia di vita.
O nessuno, o qualcuno, o forse un solo, o tu
Che mi leggi: ricorda il tempo
Prima che s'indurisse la cera,
Quando ognuno era come un sigillo.
Di noi ciascuno reca l'impronta
Dell'amico incontrato per via;
In ognuno la traccia di ognuno.
Per il bene od il male
In saggezza o in follia
Ognuno stampato da ognuno.
Ora che il tempo urge da presso,
Che le imprese sono finite,
A voi tutti l'augurio sommesso
Che l'autunno sia lungo e mite.
16 dicembre 1985
from Ad ora incerta
To My Friends
Dear friends, and here I say friends
the broad sense of the word:
Wife, sister, associates, relatives,
Schoolmates of both sexes,
People seen only once
Or frequented all my life;
Provided that between us, for at least a moment,
A line has been stretched,
A well-defined bond.
I speak for you, companions of a crowded
Road, not without its difficulties,
And for you too, who have lost
Soul, courage, the desire to live;
Or no one, or someone, or perhaps only one person, or you
Who are reading me: remember the time
Before the wax hardened,
When everyone was like a seal.
Each of us bears the imprint
Of a friend met along the way;
In each the trace of each.
For good or evil
In wisdom or in folly
Everyone stamped by everyone.
Now that the time crowds in
And the undertakings are finished,
To all of you the humble wish
That autumn will be long and mild.
A friend sent me the following poem by Tennyson, sung by a choir (I can't find her version).Ring Out, Wild Bells by Alfred Tennyson
Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.
Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.
Ring out the grief that saps the mind
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.
Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.
Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes
But ring the fuller minstrel in.
Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.
Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.
Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.
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Ring Out, Wild Bells by Alfred Tennyson
Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the f..."
Yes, please.
Mod
Ring Out, Wild Bells by Alfred Tennyson
Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the f..."
Oh, I love that!
I wanted to post the poem Consejos para la mujer fuerte/Advice for a strong woman by the Nicaraguan poet Gioconda Belli (born in 1948), but I didn't find a translation in English. Here another poem of hers about women:Menopause by Gioconda Belli
So far,
all over the world,
women have survived it.
Perhaps it was that our grandmothers were stoic
or, that back then, they weren’t entitled to complain,
still they reached old age
wilting bodies
but strong souls.
Now, instead,
dissertations are written on the subject.
As early as thirty agony sets in,
Foretelling the catastrophe.
A body is much more than the sum of its hormones.
Menopausal or not
a woman remains a woman,
beyond the production of secretions or eggs.
To miss a period does not imply the loss of syntax
or coherence;
it shouldn’t lead to hiding
as a snail in a shell,
nor provoke endless brooding.
If depression sets in
it won’t be a new occurrence,
each menstrual cycle has come to us with tears
and its load of irrational anger.
There is no reason, then,
to feel devalued:
Get rid of tampons
and sanitary napkins!
Use them to light a bonfire in your garden!
Be naked
Dance the ritual of aging
And survive
Like so many
Before you.
Menopausia
No la conozco
pero, hasta ahora,
las mujeres del mundo la han sobrevivido.
Sería por estoicismo
o porque nadie les concediera entonces
el derecho a quejarse
que nuestras abuelas
llegaron a la vejez
mustias de cuerpo
pero fuertes de alma.
En cambio ahora
se escriben tratados
y, desde los treinta,
empieza el sufrimiento,
el presentimiento de la catástrofe.
El cuerpo es mucho más que las hormonas.
menopáusica o no,
una mujer sigue siendo una mujer;
mucho más que una fábrica de humores
o de óvulos.
Perder la regla no es perder la medida,
ni las facultades;
no es meterse cual caracol
en una concha
y echarse a morir.
Si hay depresión,
no será nada nuevo;
cada sangre menstrual ha traído lágrimas
y su dosis irracional de rabia.
No hay pues ninguna razón
para sentirse devaluada.
Tirá los tampones,
las toallas sanitarias.
Hacé una hoguera con ellas en el patio de tu casa.
Desnúdate.
Bailá la danza ritual de la madurez.
Y sobreviví
como sobreviviremos todas.
Thank-You Note by Wisława SzymborskaI owe so much
to those I don't love.
The relief as I agree
that someone else needs them more.
The happiness that I'm not
the wolf to their sheep.
The peace I feel with them,
the freedom –
love can neither give
nor take that.
I don't wait for them,
as in window-to-door-and-back.
Almost as patient
as a sundial,
I understand
what love can't,
and forgive
as love never would.
From a rendezvous to a letter
is just a few days or weeks,
not an eternity.
Trips with them always go smoothly,
concerts are heard,
cathedrals visited,
scenery is seen.
And when seven hills and rivers
come between us,
the hills and rivers
can be found on any map.
They deserve the credit
if I live in three dimensions,
in nonlyrical and nonrhetorical space
with a genuine, shifting horizon.
They themselves don't realize
how much they hold in their empty hands.
"I don't owe them a thing,"
would be love's answer
to this open question.
((Translated by Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh))
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Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers to-day;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year.
Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white,
Like nothing else by day, like ghosts by night;
And make us happy in the happy bees,
The swarm dilating round the perfect trees.
And make us happy in the darting bird
That suddenly above the bees is heard,
The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill,
And off a blossom in mid air stands still.
For this is love and nothing else is love,
The which it is reserved for God above
To sanctify to what far ends He will,
But which it only needs that we fulfil.
Robert Frost - 1874-1963
Josh wrote: "A Prayer in SpringOh, give us pleasure in the flowers to-day;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year..."
Thank you.
I'm not religious, but I'm often awed by the beauty of the nature.
Amanda Palmer reading Possibilities by Wislawa Szymborska.Possibilities by Wislawa Szymborska
I prefer movies.
I prefer cats.
I prefer the oaks along the Warta.
I prefer Dickens to Dostoyevsky.
I prefer myself liking people
to myself loving mankind.
I prefer keeping a needle and thread on hand, just in case.
I prefer the color green.
I prefer not to maintain
that reason is to blame for everything.
I prefer exceptions.
I prefer to leave early.
I prefer talking to doctors about something else.
I prefer the old fine-lined illustrations.
I prefer the absurdity of writing poems
to the absurdity of not writing poems.
I prefer, where love's concerned, nonspecific anniversaries
that can be celebrated every day.
I prefer moralists
who promise me nothing.
I prefer cunning kindness to the over-trustful kind.
I prefer the earth in civvies.
I prefer conquered to conquering countries.
I prefer having some reservations.
I prefer the hell of chaos to the hell of order.
I prefer Grimms' fairy tales to the newspapers' front pages.
I prefer leaves without flowers to flowers without leaves.
I prefer dogs with uncropped tails.
I prefer light eyes, since mine are dark.
I prefer desk drawers.
I prefer many things that I haven't mentioned here
to many things I've also left unsaid.
I prefer zeroes on the loose
to those lined up behind a cipher.
I prefer the time of insects to the time of stars.
I prefer to knock on wood.
I prefer not to ask how much longer and when.
I prefer keeping in mind even the possibility
that existence has its own reason for being.
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Possibilities by Wislawa Szymborska
I prefer movies.
I prefer cats.
I prefer the oaks along the Warta.
I prefer Dickens to Dostoyevsky...."
Ooh, I like this very much.
Antonella wrote: "Amanda Palmer reading Possibilities by Wislawa Szymborska.Possibilities by Wislawa Szymborska
I prefer movies.
I prefer cats.
I prefer the oaks along the Warta.
I prefer Dickens to Dostoyevsky...."
Lovely. Thanks for posting, Antonella!
Distraction by Wislawa SzymborskaI misbehaved in the cosmos yesterday.
I lived around the clock without questions,
without surprise.
I performed daily tasks
as if only that were required.
Inhale, exhale, right foot, left, obligations,
not a thought beyond
getting there and getting back.
The world might have been taken for bedlam,
but I took it just for daily use.
No whats -- no what fors --
and why on earth it is --
and how come it needs so many moving parts.
I was like a nail stuck only halfway in the wall
or
(comparison I couldn’t find).
One change happened after another
even in a twinkling’s narrow span.
Yesterday’s bread was sliced otherwise
by a hand a day younger at a younger table.
Clouds like never before and rain like never,
since it fell after all in different drops.
The world rotated on its axis,
but in a space abandoned forever.
This took a good 24 hours.
1,440 minutes of opportunity.
86,400 seconds for inspection.
The cosmic savoir vivre
may keep silent on our subject,
still it makes a few demands:
occasional attention, one or two of Pascal’s thoughts,
and amazed participation in a game
with rules unknown.
((this time I even know the name of the translator, Clare Cavanagh, and the book Map: Collected and Last Poems))
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Possibilities by Wislawa Szymborska
I prefer movies.
I prefer cats.
I prefer the oaks along the Warta.
I prefer Dickens to Dostoyevsky...."
I love this.
HOWEVER, I PREFER DOGS.
A Litany for Survival by Audre LordeFor those of us who live at the shoreline
standing upon the constant edges of decision
crucial and alone
for those of us who cannot indulge
the passing dreams of choice
who love in doorways coming and going
in the hours between dawns
looking inward and outward
at once before and after
seeking a now that can breed
futures
like bread in our children’s mouths
so their dreams will not reflect
the death of ours;
For those of us
who were imprinted with fear
like a faint line in the center of our foreheads
learning to be afraid with our mother’s milk
for by this weapon
this illusion of some safety to be found
the heavy-footed hoped to silence us
For all of us
this instant and this triumph
We were never meant to survive.
And when the sun rises we are afraid
it might not remain
when the sun sets we are afraid
it might not rise in the morning
when our stomachs are full we are afraid
of indigestion
when our stomachs are empty we are afraid
we may never eat again
when we are loved we are afraid
love will vanish
when we are alone we are afraid
love will never return
and when we speak we are afraid
our words will not be heard
nor welcomed
but when we are silent
we are still afraid
So it is better to speak
remembering
we were never meant to survive.
From The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde
Memorial DayBy Alfred Joyce Kilmer (Joyce)
"Dulce et decorum est"
The bugle echoes shrill and sweet,
But not of war it sings to-day.
The road is rhythmic with the feet
Of men-at-arms who come to pray.
The roses blossom white and red
On tombs where weary soldiers lie;
Flags wave above the honored dead
And martial music cleaves the sky.
Above their wreath-strewn graves we kneel,
They kept the faith and fought the fight.
Through flying lead and crimson steel
They plunged for Freedom and the Right.
May we, their grateful children, learn
Their strength, who lie beneath this sod,
Who went through fire and death to earn
At last the accolade of God.
In shining rank on rank arrayed
They march, the legions of the Lord;
He is their Captain unafraid,
The Prince of Peace . . . Who brought a sword.
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By Alfred Joyce Kilmer (Joyce)
"Dulce et decorum est"
The bugle echoes shrill and sweet,
But not of war it sings to-day.
The road is rhythmic with the feet
Of men-at-arms who ..."
That sent a shiver down my spine.
Children of Our Age by Wisława SzymborskaWe are children of our age,
it’s a political age.
All day long, all through the night,
all affairs—yours, ours, theirs—
are political affairs.
Whether you like it or not,
your genes have a political past,
your skin, a political cast,
your eyes, a political slant.
Whatever you say reverberates,
whatever you don’t say speaks for itself.
So either way you’re talking politics.
Even when you take to the woods,
you’re taking political steps
on political grounds.
Apolitical poems are also political,
and above us shines a moon
no longer purely lunar.
To be or not to be, that is the question.
and though it troubles the digestion
it’s a question, as always, of politics.
To acquire a political meaning
you don’t even have to be human.
Raw material will do,
or protein feed, or crude oil,
or a conference table whose shape
was quarreled over for months:
Should we arbitrate life and death
at a round table or a square one.
Meanwhile, people perished,
animals died,
houses burned,
and the fields ran wild
just as in times immemorial
and less political.
Translated by Stanisław Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh, from Poems New and Collected. English translation copyright ©1988 by Harcourt, Inc.
Antonella wrote: "Children of Our Age by Wisława SzymborskaWe are children of our age,
it’s a political age.
All day long, all through the night,
all affairs—yours, ours, theirs—
are political affairs.
Whether y..."
So true
Mod
We are children of our age,
it’s a political age.
All day long, all through the night,
all affairs—yours, ours, theirs—
are political affairs.
Whether y..."
Hmmmm. Interesting.
here is one for either a good laugh or believing in magic:Do you believe in magic?
so you are in love so what?
with that magic feeling in the gut
you used to be the man who goes to sears
and now magically in love with Britney spears...
your floating magically all over the place
look at you its like you you've lost your grace
but you're thinking they are jealous
and what they're saying is just bogus
until that one day you're sitting with your flame
and you get called by someone else's name
you can't see the writings on the wall
that you're love has dropped the ball
you're magically turned into an idiot
you don't even know its time to exit
your love leaves you after a long fight
you magically turn into a stalker overnight
now all you ever do is shed tears
and thinking joining a group of queers
but when you're finally enjoying the weekend
excited that you have your pay check to spend
you forget that last month you were a big mess
and suddenly you long for another magic first kiss
you feel the magic again
and you forget all the pain
your pain is magically gone
you find your faith magically again
your face positively glows
you pick up a magic red rose
you have taken another cupid bait
as you walk out of for your first date
Ode to the First Day of the Year by Pablo Neruda We identify it
as if
it were
a wooden horse
different from
all horses.
We adorn
its forehead
with a ribbon,
we hang
on its neck colorful rattles,
and at midnight
we get ready to receive it
as if it were
an explorer descending from a star.
The way bread resembles
yesterday's bread,
a ring all rings:
the days
blink
clearly, jingling, fleetingly,
and lie down in the dark night.
I see the last
day
of this
year
on a train, toward the rains
of a distant purple archipelago,
and the man
on the machine,
complicated like a clock from heaven,
lowering his eyes
to the infinite
ruler of the rails,
to the shining handles,
to the nimble bonds of fire.
Of conductor of trains
accelerating
toward the black
stations of the night,
this end
of the year,
without wife or children,
is it not the same for the one gone, the one coming?
From the roads
and workshops,
the first day, the first dawn
of the starting year,
has the same rusty
color as the iron train:
and people along the way
greet it,
cows, villages,
the vapor of the first light of day,
without knowing
it is
the year's door,
a day
heralded
by bells,
adorned with plumes and carnations.
The earth
does not
know it:
it will receive
that golden
day, gray, heavenly,
it will extend it over hills,
it will wet it with
arrows
of translucent
rain,
and then
it will curl it
in a tube,
will store it in the shadows.
It is thus, but
a small
door of hope,
new year's day,
although you are
like the bread
of all breads,
we will live you in a different way,
we will eat you, flower you,
wait for you.
We will place you
like a cake
in our lives,
we will light you
like candelabra,
we will drink you
as if
you were a topaz.
New
Year's
Day,
electric day, fresh,
all the leaves
emerge green
from
the trunk of time.
Crown us
with
water,
with open
jasmine,
with all the aromas
deployed,
yes,
even though
you're
only
a day,
a poor
human day,
your halo
beats
over so many
tired
hearts,
and you are,
oh new
day,
oh forthcoming cloud,
bread unseen before,
permanent
tower!
((translated by Ilan Stavans))
Original text here, the second poem in the page: Oda al primer día del año (1957). And you can hear it here.
Mod
Do you believe in magic?
so you are in love so what?
with that magic feeling in the gut
you used to be the man who goes to sears
and n..."
hahaha I love this.
Mod
We identify it
as if
it were
a wooden horse
different from
all horses.
We adorn
its forehead
with a ribbon,
we hang
on its neck colorful rattles,..."
Neruda is so marvelous.
Mod
NEW YEAR'S EVE
D.H. Lawrence
HERE are only two things now,
The great black night scooped out
And this fire-glow.
This fire-glow, the core,
And we the two ripe pips
That are held in store.
Listen, the darkness rings
As it circulates round our fire.
Take off your things.
Your shoulders, your bruised throat!
Your breasts, your nakedness!
This fiery coat!
As the darkness flickers and dips,
As the firelight falls and leaps
From your feet to your lips!
1919
Reciprocity by Wislawa SzymborskaThere are catalogues of catalogues.
There are poems about poems.
There are plays about actors played by actors.
Letters due to letters.
Words used to clarify words.
Brains occupied with studying brains.
There are griefs as infectious as laughter.
Papers emerging from waste papers.
Seen glances.
Conditions conditioned by the conditional.
Large rivers with major contributions from small ones.
Forests grown over and above by forests.
Machines designed to make machines.
Dreams that wake us suddenly from dreams.
Health needed for regaining health.
Stairs leading as much up as down.
Glasses for finding glasses.
Inspiration born of expiration.
And even if only from time to time
hatred of hatred.
All in all,
ignorance of ignorance
and hands employed to wash hands.
— This poem appeared in The New Yorker, February 3, 2014, p. 28.
Amanda Gorman reads her poem, The Hill We Climb, at President Joe Biden’s inauguration: https://youtu.be/LZ055ilIiN4
To celebrate St. Brigid's Day 2021, the Department of Foreign Affairs and MoLI - Museum of Literature Ireland, have collaborated on ‘Three Poems for Brigid’, a series of three short online films. Each film showcases a poet and a spoken word performer, and is based around one of the three aspects of Brigid as the triple goddess of Poetry, Healing, and Craftwork.At Bridget's Well - Doireann Ní Ghríofa
Old Biddy Talk – Paula Meehan
i mbolc - Nidhi Zak/Aria Eipe
A spring poem by a great Italian poet, Nobel Prize for Literature in 1959.Mirror (1930) by Salvatore Quasimodo
And suddenly on the trunk
buds break open:
a green newer than the grass
which soothes the heart:
the trunk already seemed dead,
bent on the ravine.
And everything seems like a miracle;
and I’m that rainwater
that today reflects in the ditches
a deeper blue its piece of sky,
that green that splits the crust
which even last night wasn’t there.
Specchio
Ed ecco sul tronco
si rompono gemme:
un verde più nuovo dell’erba
che il cuore riposa:
il tronco pareva già morto,
piegato sul botro.
E tutto mi sa di miracolo;
e sono quell’acqua di nube
che oggi rispecchia nei fossi
più azzurro il suo pezzo di cielo,
quel verde che spacca la scorza
che pure stanotte non c’era.
Q&A with Josh Lanyon
Books mentioned in this topic
Mr. Cogito (other topics)Don't Mention the Children (other topics)
Writing Haiku: A Beginner's Guide to Composing Japanese Poetry (other topics)
Dear Writer: Pep Talks & Practical Advice for the Creative Life (other topics)
The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Zbigniew Herbert (other topics)Vanni Bianconi (other topics)
Pablo Neruda (other topics)
Michael Rosen (other topics)
Michael Rosen (other topics)
More...
This time let me
be happy.
Nothing has happened to anybody,
I am nowhere special,
it happened only
that I am happy
through the four chambers
of my h..."
What a lovely glimpse into happiness, Antonella.