My poetry looks like a heavensickness.
The paradise from which I was exiled
is locked up tight. Nor luck, nor mental quickness,
nor tractable iambuses, nor wild,
limped on their right leg trochees, nor bad English
(oh, those “which” and “that” I can’t distinguish,
or, say, the tenses. What a hellish tongue!
Sometimes I wish I died when I was young),
nor Russian, my insane experimenter
and faithful servant (though, some dura'ki*
find it's not true) – that’s not enough to enter,
and all I really need is just a key.
Alas, I haven’t. But through the keyhole
I see footprints of angels on my soul.
* (rus.) fools
Categories:
tractable, paradise, poetry,
Form: Sonnet
As people we are not just halves of souls
Do not pursue completion as but one.
We’ll find security in our own roles
And we’ll be stronger than when we’d begun.
Our time together moves too quickly, dear.
Since time itself we sorrowfully lack
I would not hesitate to hold you near
To never feel alone, mislaid in black
Lo, in the end it’s all irrelevant,
But insignificance is tractable
When holding you my love, so elegant.
Around you my concerns are placable.
Combined there’s nothing we won’t rise above
We needn’t feel afraid of lust nor love
Categories:
tractable, change, growth, introspection, love,
Form: Sonnet
It was on a day quite ordinary
that the stream of consciousness
bore gifts of green and white
and frozen silver,
where the old ones walked.
For here a boy
about to turn away
broke off his waking reverie
when something, not quite rising
as a memory,
thrust in upon the scene
and bound its peace.
From out of history it came
to all the tumult,
sacrificing time,
its blood not stanched
but flowing still. He climbs
the stockyard fence to watch
the mewling ghosts
hold sway once more, while
just beyond the hill,
the pines are sheltering
the little owls who never sleep--
their wisdom tractable
and flashing from their eyes.
~
Categories:
tractable, childhood,
Form: Free verse
WHAT DO THESE BIRDS KNOW ?
Darkest day cold morning
Birds a-twitter in the bare tree
Yesterday they were silent at dawning
What do they see that I don’t see?
Weather is going to have less bite?
Cats have become more tractable?
Just glad to have survived the cold night,
Hoping that today will be passable?
Maybe they know that the days
Have reached their nadir and
It’s all uphill from now on? I gaze
At the tree and try to understand.
Categories:
tractable, animals
Form: Quatrain