Written by
Marvin Bell |
Gray rainwater lay on the grass in the late afternoon.
The carp lay on the bottom, resting, while dusk took shape
in the form of the first stirrings of his hunger,
and the trees, shorter and heavier, breathed heavily upward.
Into this sodden, nourishing afternoon I emerged,
partway toward a paycheck, halfway toward the weekend,
carrying the last mail and holding above still puddles
the books of noble ideas. Through the fervent branches,
carried by momentary breezes of local origin,
the palpable Sublime flickered as motes on broad leaves,
while the Higher Good and the Greater Good contended
as sap on the bark of the maples, and even I
was enabled to witness the truly Existential where it loitered
famously in the shadows as if waiting for the moon.
All this I saw in the late afternoon in the company of no one.
And of course I went back to work the next morning. Like you,
like anyone, like the rumored angels of high office,
like the demon foremen, the bedeviled janitors, like you,
I returned to my job--but now there was a match-head in
my thoughts.
In its light, the morning increasingly flamed through the window
and, lit by nothing but mind-light, I saw that the horizon
was an idea of the eye, gilded from within, and the sun
the fiery consolation of our nighttimes, coming far.
Within this expectant air, which had waited the night indoors,
carried by--who knows?--the rhythmic jarring of brain tissue
by footsteps, by colors visible to closed eyes, by a music
in my head, knowledge gathered that could not last the day,
love and error were shaken as if by the eye of a storm,
and it would not be until quitting that such a man
might drop his arms, that he had held up all day since the dew.
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Written by
Thomas Blackburn |
By your unnumbered charities
A miracle disclose,
Lord of the Images, whose love
The eyelids and the rose
Takes for a language, and today
Tell to me what is said
By these men in a turnip field
And their unleavened bread.
For all things seem to figure out
The stirrings of your heart,
And two men pick the turnips up
And two men pull the cart;
And yet between the four of them
No word is ever said
Because the yeast was not put in
Which makes the human bread.
But three men stare on vacancy
And one man strokes his knees;
What is the meaning to be found
In such dark vowels as these?
Lord of the Images, whose love
The eyelid and the rose
Takes for a metaphor, today,
Beneath the warder's blows,
The unleavened man did not cry out
Or turn his face away;
Through such men in a turnip field
What is it that you say?
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Written by
Rg Gregory |
(for matt – 15)
in the first seven years you choose your howdah
having by then bare inklings of a journey
but where or why - confusion there to cloud a
judgement no more ready than a sore knee
to enter the lists of a whole life’s tourney -
but after this howdah-do (this introduction)
what’s to carry you where - from muddy fluxion
and glimpsing that a howdah does for two
(from seven years on the stirrings can be frantic)
you start to map the high ride (define the view)
and long for gilt and pomp (a touch of tantric)
relationships at best quite sycophantic
you dream of elephants clad in rich brocades
ideas to match your own fanfaronades
at fifteen then you’re really setting out
the sun’s dressed up to let you think life’s bright
your flag’s up front to give you extra clout
the chores are borne below (and out of sight)
you’ve made a noon of every slinking midnight
the continent is yours (let no one mock it)
yours the wheel to which all else a sprocket
in sri lanka in the kandy perahera
every august in a festival procession
an elephant richly dressed (the stately bearer)
carries on its back in howdah-fashion
a casket (such the grandeur of its mission))
in which the buddha’s sacred tooth’s enshrined
an image that your journey brings to mind
that tooth’s the root of all deep human struggle
and life for each proceeds by that shrined truth
which (clearly seen) yet causes thought to boggle
in what dimension lies the total proof
that that enamelled shard is all-wise tooth
and not a figment of the brain’s rash wish
to puff dull want as in a cloud of hashish
old tooth (your truth) life’s slow (but rushing) voyage
that lonely cavalcade that buzzing dreams spell out
towards elusive man but keep you in your boy-age
a noble sense of self impugned by doubt
and yet (inside you caged) a regal shout
pomp should be there to honour your advancement
and you are right to sip from that entrancement
then be that casket the buddha’s tooth ennobles
have that howdah’s view of how dah world grows
choose your elephant well to ride your troubles
(let flag and rich brocade shine through such woes)
what others think can’t hurt what your heart knows
it’s a bumpy business this festive spirit’s trek
a well-sprung joy best cushion for your neck
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Written by
Ted Hughes |
Terrifying are the attent sleek thrushes on the lawn,
More coiled steel than living - a poised
Dark deadly eye, those delicate legs
Triggered to stirrings beyond sense - with a start, a bounce,
a stab
Overtake the instant and drag out some writhing thing.
No indolent procrastinations and no yawning states,
No sighs or head-scratchings. Nothing but bounce and stab
And a ravening second.
Is it their single-mind-sized skulls, or a trained
Body, or genius, or a nestful of brats
Gives their days this bullet and automatic
Purpose? Mozart's brain had it, and the shark's mouth
That hungers down the blood-smell even to a leak of its own
Side and devouring of itself: efficiency which
Strikes too streamlined for any doubt to pluck at it
Or obstruction deflect.
With a man it is otherwise. Heroisms on horseback,
Outstripping his desk-diary at a broad desk,
Carving at a tiny ivory ornament
For years: his act worships itself - while for him,
Though he bends to be blent in the prayer, how loud and
above what
Furious spaces of fire do the distracting devils
Orgy and hosannah, under what wilderness
Of black silent waters weep.
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Written by
Emily Dickinson |
The Sun kept stooping -- stooping -- low!
The Hills to meet him rose!
On his side, what Transaction!
On their side, what Repose!
Deeper and deeper grew the stain
Upon the window pane --
Thicker and thicker stood the feet
Until the Tyrian
Was crowded dense with Armies --
So gay, so Brigadier --
That I felt martial stirrings
Who once the Cockade wore --
Charged from my chimney corner --
But Nobody was there!
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Written by
Sidney Lanier |
Written for the "Martha Washington Court Journal".
Down cold snow-stretches of our bitter time,
When windy shams and the rain-mocking sleet
Of Trade have cased us in such icy rime
That hearts are scarcely hot enough to beat,
Thy fame, O Lady of the lofty eyes,
Doth fall along the age, like as a lane
Of Spring, in whose most generous boundaries
Full many a frozen virtue warms again.
To-day I saw the pale much-burdened form
Of Charity come limping o'er the line,
And straighten from the bending of the storm
And flush with stirrings of new strength divine,
Such influence and sweet gracious impulse came
Out of the beams of thine immortal name!
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