Written by
Lucy Maud Montgomery |
Lo, I have loved thee long, long have I yearned and entreated!
Tell me how I may win thee, tell me how I must woo.
Shall I creep to thy white feet, in guise of a humble lover ?
Shall I croon in mild petition, murmuring vows anew ?
Shall I stretch my arms unto thee, biding thy maiden coyness,
Under the silver of morning, under the purple of night ?
Taming my ancient rudeness, checking my heady clamor
Thus, is it thus I must woo thee, oh, my delight?
Nay, 'tis no way of the sea thus to be meekly suitor
I shall storm thee away with laughter wrapped in my beard of snow,
With the wildest of billows for chords I shall harp thee a song for thy bridal,
A mighty lyric of love that feared not nor would forego!
With a red-gold wedding ring, mined from the caves of sunset,
Fast shall I bind thy faith to my faith evermore,
And the stars will wait on our pleasure, the great north wind will trumpet
A thunderous marriage march for the nuptials of sea and shore.
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Written by
Billy Collins |
I wait for the holiday crowd to clear the beach
before stepping onto the first wave.
Soon I am walking across the Atlantic
thinking about Spain,
checking for whales, waterspouts.
I feel the water holding up my shifting weight.
Tonight I will sleep on its rocking surface.
But for now I try to imagine what
this must look like to the fish below,
the bottoms of my feet appearing, disappearing.
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Written by
Jorie Graham |
All this was written on the next day's list.
On which the busyness unfurled its cursive roots,
pale but effective,
and the long stem of the necessary, the sum of events,
built-up its tiniest cathedral...
(Or is it the sum of what takes place? )
If I lean down, to whisper, to them,
down into their gravitational field, there where they head busily on
into the woods, laying the gifts out one by one, onto the path,
hoping to be on the air,
hoping to please the children --
(and some gifts overwrapped and some not wrapped at all) -- if
I stir the wintered ground-leaves
up from the paths, nimbly, into a sheet of sun,
into an escape-route-width of sun, mildly gelatinous where wet, though mostly
crisp,
fluffing them up a bit, and up, as if to choke the singularity of sun
with this jubilation of manyness, all through and round these passers-by --
just leaves, nothing that can vaporize into a thought,
no, a burning bush's worth of spidery, up-ratcheting, tender-cling leaves,
oh if -- the list gripped hard by the left hand of one,
the busyness buried so deep into the puffed-up greenish mind of one,
the hurried mind hovering over its rankings,
the heart -- there at the core of the drafting leaves -- wet and warm at the
zero of
the bright mock-stairwaying-up of the posthumous leaves -- the heart,
formulating its alleyways of discovery,
fussing about the integrity of the whole,
the heart trying to make time and place seem small,
sliding its slim tears into the deep wallet of each new event
on the list
then checking it off -- oh the satisfaction -- each check a small kiss,
an echo of the previous one, off off it goes the dry high-ceilinged
obligation,
checked-off by the fingertips, by the small gust called done that swipes
the unfinishable's gold hem aside, revealing
what might have been, peeling away what should . . .
There are flowerpots at their feet.
There is fortune-telling in the air they breathe.
It filters-in with its flashlight-beam, its holy-water-tinted air,
down into the open eyes, the lampblack open mouth.
Oh listen to these words I'm spitting out for you.
My distance from you makes them louder.
Are we all waiting for the phone to ring?
Who should it be? What fountain is expected to
thrash forth mysteries of morning joy? What quail-like giant tail of
promises, pleiades, psalters, plane-trees,
what parapets petalling-forth the invisible
into the world of things,
turning the list into its spatial-form at last,
into its archival many-headed, many-legged colony . . .
Oh look at you.
What is it you hold back? What piece of time is it the list
won't cover? You down there, in the theater of
operations -- you, throat of the world -- so diacritical --
(are we all waiting for the phone to ring?) --
(what will you say? are you home? are you expected soon?) --
oh wanderer back from break, all your attention focused
-- as if the thinking were an oar, this ship the last of some
original fleet, the captains gone but some of us
who saw the plan drawn-out
still here -- who saw the thinking clot-up in the bodies of the greater men,
who saw them sit in silence while the voices in the other room
lit-up with passion, itchings, dreams of landings,
while the solitary ones,
heads in their hands, so still,
the idea barely forming
at the base of that stillness,
the idea like a homesickness starting just to fold and pleat and knot-itself
out of the manyness -- the plan -- before it's thought,
before it's a done deal or the name-you're-known-by --
the men of x, the outcomes of y -- before --
the mind still gripped hard by the hands
that would hold the skull even stiller if they could,
that nothing distract, that nothing but the possible be let to filter
through,
the possible and then the finely filamented hope, the filigree,
without the distractions of wonder --
oh tiny golden spore just filtering-in to touch the good idea,
which taking-form begins to twist,
coursing for bottom-footing, palpating for edge-hold, limit,
now finally about to
rise, about to go into the other room -- and yet
not having done so yet, not yet -- the
intake -- before the credo, before the plan --
right at the homesickness -- before this list you hold
in your exhausted hand. Oh put it down.
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Written by
Sharon Olds |
She was four, he was one, it was raining, we had colds,
we had been in the apartment two weeks straight,
I grabbed her to keep her from shoving him over on his
face, again, and when I had her wrist
in my grasp I compressed it, fiercely, for a couple
of seconds, to make an impression on her,
to hurt her, our beloved firstborn, I even almost
savored the stinging sensation of the squeezing,
the expression, into her, of my anger,
"Never, never, again," the righteous
chant accompanying the clasp. It happened very
fast-grab, crush, crush,
crush, release-and at the first extra
force, she swung her head, as if checking
who this was, and looked at me,
and saw me-yes, this was her mom,
her mom was doing this. Her dark,
deeply open eyes took me
in, she knew me, in the shock of the moment
she learned me. This was her mother, one of the
two whom she most loved, the two
who loved her most, near the source of love
was this.
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Written by
Gary Snyder |
One afternoon the last week in April
Showing Kai how to throw a hatchet
One-half turn and it sticks in a stump.
He recalls the hatchet-head
Without a handle, in the shop
And go gets it, and wants it for his own.
A broken-off axe handle behind the door
Is long enough for a hatchet,
We cut it to length and take it
With the hatchet head
And working hatchet, to the wood block.
There I begin to shape the old handle
With the hatchet, and the phrase
First learned from Ezra Pound
Rings in my ears!
"When making an axe handle
the pattern is not far off."
And I say this to Kai
"Look: We'll shape the handle
By checking the handle
Of the axe we cut with—"
And he sees. And I hear it again:
It's in Lu Ji's We Fu, fourth century
A.D. "Essay on Literature" - in the
Preface: "In making the handle
Of an axe
By cutting wood with an axe
The model is indeed near at hand."
My teacher Shih-hsiang Chen
Translated that and taught it years ago
And I see: Pound was an axe,
Chen was an axe, I am an axe
And my son a handle, soon
To be shaping again, model
And tool, craft of culture,
How we go on.
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Written by
Louise Gluck |
You want to know how I spend my time?
I walk the front lawn, pretending
to be weeding. You ought to know
I'm never weeding, on my knees, pulling
clumps of clover from the flower beds: in fact
I'm looking for courage, for some evidence
my life will change, though
it takes forever, checking
each clump for the symbolic
leaf, and soon the summer is ending, already
the leaves turning, always the sick trees
going first, the dying turning
brilliant yellow, while a few dark birds perform
their curfew of music. You want to see my hands?
As empty now as at the first note.
Or was the point always
to continue without a sign?
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
[Pg 76] CANZONE X. Poichè per mio destino. IN PRAISE OF LAURA'S EYES: IN THEM HE FINDS EVERY GOOD, AND HE CAN NEVER CEASE TO PRAISE THEM. Since then by destinyI am compell'd to sing the strong desire,Which here condemns me ceaselessly to sigh,May Love, whose quenchless fireExcites me, be my guide and point the way,And in the sweet task modulate my lay:But gently be it, lest th' o'erpowering themeInflame and sting me, lest my fond heart mayDissolve in too much softness, which I deem,From its sad state, may be:For in me—hence my terror and distress!Not now as erst I seeJudgment to keep my mind's great passion less:Nay, rather from mine own thoughts melt I so,As melts before the summer sun the snow. At first I fondly thoughtCommuning with mine ardent flame to winSome brief repose, some time of truce within:This was the hope which broughtMe courage what I suffer'd to explain,Now, now it leaves me martyr to my pain:But still, continuing mine amorous song,Must I the lofty enterprise maintain;So powerful is the wish that in me glows,That Reason, which so longRestrain'd it, now no longer can oppose.Then teach me, Love, to singIn such frank guise, that ever if the earOf my sweet foe should chance the notes to hear,Pity, I ask no more, may in her spring. If, as in other times,When kindled to true virtue was mankind,The genius, energy of man could findEntrance in divers climes,Mountains and seas o'erpassing, seeking thereHonour, and culling oft its garland fair,[Pg 77]Mine were such wish, not mine such need would be.From shore to shore my weary course to trace,Since God, and Love, and Nature deign for meEach virtue and each graceIn those dear eyes where I rejoice to place.In life to them must ITurn as to founts whence peace and safety swell:And e'en were death, which else I fear not, nigh,Their sight alone would teach me to be well. As, vex'd by the fierce wind,The weary sailor lifts at night his gazeTo the twin lights which still our pole displays,So, in the storms unkindOf Love which I sustain, in those bright eyesMy guiding light and only solace lies:But e'en in this far more is due to theft,Which, taught by Love, from time to time, I makeOf secret glances than their gracious gift:Yet that, though rare and slight,Makes me from them perpetual model take;Since first they blest my sightNothing of good without them have I tried,Placing them over me to guard and guide,Because mine own worth held itself but light. Never the full effectCan I imagine, and describe it lessWhich o'er my heart those soft eyes still possess!As worthless I rejectAnd mean all other joys that life confers,E'en as all other beauties yield to hers.A tranquil peace, alloy'd by no distress,Such as in heaven eternally abides,Moves from their lovely and bewitching smile.So could I gaze, the whileLove, at his sweet will, governs them and guides,—E'en though the sun were nigh,Resting above us on his onward wheel—On her, intensely with undazzled eye,Nor of myself nor others think or feel. Ah! that I should desireThings that can never in this world be won,[Pg 78]Living on wishes hopeless to acquire.Yet, were the knot undone,Wherewith my weak tongue Love is wont to bind,Checking its speech, when her sweet face puts onAll its great charms, then would I courage find,Words on that point so apt and new to use,As should make weep whoe'er might hear the tale.But the old wounds I bear,Stamp'd on my tortured heart, such power refuse;Then grow I weak and pale,And my blood hides itself I know not where;Nor as I was remain I: hence I knowLove dooms my death and this the fatal blow. Farewell, my song! already do I seeHeavily in my hand the tired pen moveFrom its long dear discourse with her I love;Not so my thoughts from communing with me. Macgregor.
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Written by
Brian P Cleary |
Some cats like to prowl,
and some even growl,
While others would rather take naps.
But my Mrs. Mittens --
an Internet Kitten -- is
fonder of laptops than laps.
Unlike other cats,
This one downloads and chats
And is constantly checking her email.
An ad she has posted
Has recently boasted
She's a young, single Siamese female.
With paws soft and quick,
She'll type and she'll click,
do some research, or maybe some shopping.
She bookmarks new sites.
She surfs and she writes,
Or she'll scan in some photos for swapping.
It's simply absurd.
She's an Internet nerd,
Who ignores all the rest of the house.
What cat would admit
It would ever see fit
To enjoy so much time with a mouse?
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Written by
Robert William Service |
A grey gull hovered overhead,
Then wisely flew away.
'In half a jiffy you'll be dead,'
I thought I heard it say;
As there upon the railway line,
Checking an urge to cough,
I laboured to de-fuse the mine
That had not yet gone off.
I tapped around the time-clock rim,
Then something worried me.
I heard the singing of a hymn:
Nearer my God to Thee.
That damned Salvation Army band!
I phoned back to the boys:
'Please tell them,--they will understand,--
Cut out the bloody noise!'
Silence . . . I went to work anew,
And then I heard a tick
That told me the blast was due,--
I never ran so quick.
I heard the fury-roar behind;
The earth erupted hell,
As hoisted high and stunned and blind
Into a ditch I fell.
Then when at last I crawled from cover,
My hands were bloody raw;
And I was blue and bruised all over,
And this is what I saw:
All pale, but panting with elation,
And very much unstuck,
There was the Army of Salvation
Emerging from the muck.
And then I heard the Captain saying:
''Twas Heaven heard our pleas;
For there anight we all were praying
Down on our bended knees.
'Twas little hope your comrades gave you,
Though we had faith divine . . .
The blessed Lord stooped down to save you,
But Gosh! He cut it fine.'
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