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by
Mark Doty
Over the terminal,
the arms and chest
of the god
brightened by snow.
Formerly mercury,
formerly silver,
surface yellowed
by atmospheric sulphurs
acid exhalations,
and now the shining
thing's descendant.
Obscure passages,
dim apertures:
these clouded windows
show a few faces
or some empty car's
filmstrip of lit flames
--remember them
from school,
how they were supposed
to teach us something?--
waxy light hurrying
inches away from the phantom
smudge of us, vague
in spattered glass. Then
daylight's soft charcoal
lusters stone walls
and we ascend to what
passes for brightness,
this February,
scumbled sky
above graduated zones
of decline:
dead rowhouses,
charred windows'
wet frames
around empty space,
a few chipboard polemics
nailed over the gaps,
speeches too long
and obsessive for anyone
on this train to read,
sealing the hollowed interiors
--some of them grand once,
you can tell by
the fillips of decoration,
stone leaves, the frieze
of sunflowers.
Desolate fields--open spaces,
in a city where you
can hardly turn around!--
seem to center
on little flames,
something always burning
in a barrel or can
As if to represent
inextinguishable,
dogged persistence?
Though whether what burns
is will or rage or
harsh amalgam
I couldn't say.
But I can tell you this,
what I've seen that
won my allegiance most,
though it was also
the hallmark of our...
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by
William Topaz McGonagall
Good people of high and low degree,
I pray ye all to list to me,
And I'll relate a harrowing tale of the sea
Concerning the burning of the ship "Kent" in the Bay of Biscay,
Which is the most appalling tale of the present century.
She carried a crew, including officers, of 148 men,
And twenty lady passengers along with them;
Besides 344 men of the 31st Regiment,
And twenty officers with them, all seemingly content.
Also fhe soldiers' wives, which numbered forty-three,
And sixty-six children, a most beautiful sight to see;
And in the year of 1825, and on the 19th of February,
The ship "Kent" sailed from the Downs right speedily,
While the passengers' hearts felt light with glee.
And the beautiful ship proceeded on her way to Bengal,
While the passengers were cheerful one and all;
And the sun shone out in brilliant array,
And on the evening of the 28th they entered the Bay of Biscay.
But a gale from the south-west sprang up that night,
Which filled the passengers' hearts with fright;
And it continued to increase in violence as the night wore on,
Whilst the lady passengers looked very woe-begone.
Part of the cargo in the hold consisted of shot and shell,
And the vessel rolled heavily as the big...
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by
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
January
Janus am I; oldest of potentates;
Forward I look, and backward, and below
I count, as god of avenues and gates,
The years that through my portals come and go.
I block the roads, and drift the fields with snow;
I chase the wild-fowl from the frozen fen;
My frosts congeal the rivers in their flow,
My fires light up the hearths and hearts of men.
February
I am lustration, and the sea is mine!
I wash the sands and headlands with my tide;
My brow is crowned with branches of the pine;
Before my chariot-wheels the fishes glide.
By me all things unclean are purified,
By me the souls of men washed white again;
E'en the unlovely tombs of those who died
Without a dirge, I cleanse from every stain.
March
I Martius am! Once first, and now the third!
To lead the Year was my appointed place;
A mortal dispossessed me by a word,
And set there Janus with the double face.
Hence I make war on all the human race;
I shake the cities with my hurricanes;
I flood the rivers and their banks efface,
And drown the farms and hamlets with my rains.
April
I open wide...
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by
Barry Tebb
Alone in Sutton with Fynbos my orange cat
A long weekend of wind and rain drowning
The tumultuous flurry of mid-February blossom
A surfeit of letters to work through, a mountain
Of files to sort, some irritation at the thought
Of travelling to Kentish Town alone when
My mind was flooded with the mellifluous voice
Of Heath-Stubbs on tape reading ‘The Divided Ways’
In memory of Sidney Keyes.
“He has gone down into the dark cellar
To talk with the bright faced Spirit with silver hair
But I shall never know what word was spoken there.”
The best reader of the century, if not the best poet.
Resonant, mesmeric, his verse the anti-type of mine,
Classical, not personal, Apollonian not Dionysian
And most unconfessional but nonetheless a poet
Deserving honour in his eighty-fifth year.
Thirty people crowded into a room
With stacked chairs like a Sunday School
A table of pamphlets looked over but not bought
A lacquered screen holding court, a century’s junk.
An ivory dial telephone, a bowl of early daffodils
To focus on.
I was the first to read, speaking of James Simmons’ death,
My anguish at the year long silence from his last letter
To the Christmas card in Gaelic Nollaig Shona -
With the message “Jimmy’s doing better than expected.”
The difficulty I had in finding his publisher’s address -
Salmon Press,...
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by
Allen Ginsberg
When I die
I don't care what happens to my body
throw ashes in the air, scatter 'em in East River
bury an urn in Elizabeth New Jersey, B'nai Israel Cemetery
But l want a big funeral
St. Patrick's Cathedral, St. Mark's Church, the largest synagogue in
Manhattan
First, there's family, brother, nephews, spry aged Edith stepmother
96, Aunt Honey from old Newark,
Doctor Joel, cousin Mindy, brother Gene one eyed one ear'd, sister-
in-law blonde Connie, five nephews, stepbrothers & sisters
their grandchildren,
companion Peter Orlovsky, caretakers Rosenthal & Hale, Bill Morgan--
Next, teacher Trungpa Vajracharya's ghost mind, Gelek Rinpoche,
there Sakyong Mipham, Dalai Lama alert, chance visiting
America, Satchitananda Swami
Shivananda, Dehorahava Baba, Karmapa XVI, Dudjom Rinpoche,
Katagiri & Suzuki Roshi's phantoms
Baker, Whalen, Daido Loorie, Qwong, Frail White-haired Kapleau
Roshis, Lama Tarchen --
Then, most important, lovers over half-century
Dozens, a hundred, more, older fellows bald & rich
young boys met naked recently in bed, crowds surprised to see each
other, innumerable, intimate, exchanging memories
"He taught me to meditate, now I'm an old veteran of the thousand
day retreat --"
"I played music on subway platforms, I'm straight but loved him he
loved me"
"I felt more love from him at 19...
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by
Barry Tebb
THE KINGDOM OF MY HEART
1
The halcyon settled on the Aire of our days
Kingfisher-blue it broke my heart in two
Shall I forget you? Shall I forget you?
I am the mad poet first love
You never got over
You are my blue-eyed
Madonna virgin bride
I shall carve ‘MG loves BT’
On the bark of every
Wind-bent tree in
East End Park
2
The park itself will blossom
And grow in chiaroscuro
The Victorian postcard’s view
Of avenue upon avenue
With palms and pagodas
Lakes and waterfalls and
A fountain from Versailles.
3
You shall be my queen
In the Kingdom of Deira
Land of many rivers
Aire the greatest
Isara the strong one
Robed in stillness
Wide, deep and dark.
4
In Middleton Woods
Margaret and I played
Truth or dare
She bared her breasts
To the watching stars.
5
“Milk, milk,
Lemonade, round
The corner
Chocolate spread”
Nancy chanted at
Ten in the binyard
Touching her tits,
Her cunt, her bum,
Margaret joined in
Chanting in unison.
6
The skipping rope
Turned faster
And faster, slapping
The hot pavement,
Margaret skipped
In rhythm, never
Missing a beat,
Lifting the pleat
Of her skirt
Whirling and twirling.
7
Giggling and red
Margaret said
In a whisper
“When we were
Playing at Nancy’s
She pushed a spill
Of paper up her
You-know-what
She said she’d
Let you watch
If you wanted.”
8
Margaret, this Saturday morning in June
There is a queue at the ‘Princess’ for
The matin?e, down the alley by the blank
Concrete of the cinema’s side I hide
With you, we are counting our picture
Money,...
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by
Barry Tebb
THE LANDS OF MY CHILDHOOD
1
I am leaving the holy city of Leeds
For the last time for the first time
Leaded domes of minarets in Kirkgate
Market, the onion-dome of Ellerby Lane
School, the lands of my childhood empty
Or gone. Market stalls under wrought
Iron balconies strewn with roses and
Green imitation grass, a girl as beautiful
As the sun who might be Margaret’s
Daughter or Margaret herself half a
Lifetime earlier, with straw-gold hair
The colour of lank February grass.
2
Cook’s Moor End Works with three broken
Windows, lathes and benches open to the
Wind of my eyes this Sunday morning as I
Fly over the cobbles of Leeds nine to the
Aire’s side, the steps broken under the weight
Of the Transpennine Trail; forty years ago
I stood here with Margaret who whispered
In my ear, “I love you, I love you”.
Margaret, Margaret, where are you?
3
Great timbered escarpments over green and grey
Terraces to the rolling sky following the shiny way
To the Cimarron in the purple distance.
4
Margaret, I am making you of sun and shadow,
Of harp and violin, silk and satin skin,
Bluebell and harebell, sand and wave, grass
On the hillocks of the Hollows, the violet
Tears of your eyes.
Breath and rhythm
Now and always
Heart and head
Sister, lover,
Bride and mother.
5
The heron on high stilts through the sky
Over the Band...
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by
Richard Brautigan
a novel by Richard Brautigan
THE COVER FOR
TROUT FISHING IN AMERICA
The cover for Trout Fishing in America is a photograph taken
late in the afternoon, a photograph of the Benjamin Franklin
statue in San Francisco's Washington Square.
Born 1706--Died 1790, Benjamin Franklin stands on a
pedestal that looks like a house containing stone furniture.
He holds some papers in one hand and his hat in the other.
Then the statue speaks, saying in marble:
PRESENTED BY
H. D. COGSWELL
TO OUR
BOYS AND GIRLS
WHO WILL SOON
TAKE OUR PLACES
AND PASS ON.
Around the base of the statue are four words facing the
directions of this world, to the east WELCOME, to the west
WELCOME, to the north WELCOME, to the south WELCOME.
Just behind the statue are three poplar trees, almost leafless
except for the top branches. The statue stands in front
of the middle tree. All around the grass is wet from the
rains of early February.
In the background is a tall cypress tree, almost dark like
a room. Adlai Stevenson spoke under the tree in 1956, before
a crowd of 40, 000 people.
There is a tall church across the street from the statue
with crosses, steeples, bells and a vast door that looks...
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by
Barry Tebb
AGAINST THE GRAIN
“Oxford be silent, I this truth must write
Leeds hath for rarities undone thee quite.”
- William Dawson of Hackney, Nov.7th 1704
“The repressed becomes the poem”
Louise Bogan
1
Well it’s Friday the thirteenth
So I’d better begin with luck
As I prepare for a journey to
The north, the place where I began
And I was lucky even before I
Was born for the red-hot shrapnel fell
And missed my mother by an inch
As she walked through the Blitz
In Bradford in nineteen forty-one.
Sydney Graham this poem is for you,
Although we never met, your feet
Have walked on the waters of poetic faith,
Hold out a hand for me to grasp,
A net to catch the dancing reflections
Of the midnight stars and smooth
The green tongue of the seawave
When it speaks to me as I slide
From my mother’s turning side.
For years I lived in the gardens
Of fire and flames robed time in
Memory and desire, icicles climbed
Six inches up the kitchen window
Then six inches down and six feet
Of snow lay against the POW’s as they
Marched with hefted shovels from
Knostrop’s cottage camp with curling
Smoke signalling from crooked stacks.
2
Yards from where I lay Hendry and
Moore sat in their attic conceiving
The Apocalypse and my natal stars
Were their ineffable words.
Shut off the telephone, I hear
Another...
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