Because life’s too short to blush,
I keep my blood tucked in.
I won’t be mortified
by what I drive or the flaccid
vivacity of my last dinner party.
I take my cue from statues posing only
in their shoulder pads of snow: all January
you can see them working on their granite tans.
That I woke at an ungainly hour,
stripped of the merchandise that clothed me,
distilled to pure suchness,
means not enough to anyone for me
to confess. I do not suffer
from the excess of taste
that spells embarrassment:
mothers who find their kids unseemly
in their condom earrings,
girls cringing to think
they could be frumpish as their mothers.
Though the late nonerotic Elvis
in his studded gut of jumpsuit
made everybody squeamish, I admit.
Rule one: the King must not elicit pity.
Was the audience afraid of being tainted
–this might rub off on me–
or were they–surrendering–
what a femme word–feeling
solicitous–glimpsing their fragility
in his reversible purples
and unwholesome goldish chains?
At least embarrassment is not an imitation.
It’s intimacy for beginners,
the orgasm no one cares to fake.
I almost admire it. I almost wrote despise.
Copyright ©:
Alice Fulton
A few random poems:
- Ольга Седакова – В это зыбкое скопленье
- Russia To The Pacifists by Rudyard Kipling
- Houses Of Dreams by Sara Teasdale
- Upon An Eunuch; A Poet. Fragment poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- Twenty-Four Hokku On A Modern Theme poem – Amy Lowell poems | Poems and Poetry
- Nimrod in September by Siegfried Sassoon
- To A Lady On The Death Of The Three Relations by Phillis Wheatley
- Sonnet. Written Before Re-Read King Lear poem – John Keats poems
- Yosa Buson – Yosa Buson
- A Coloured Print by Shokei poem – Amy Lowell poems | Poems and Poetry
- I shall not be a shame by Torm Gardson
- Be Lost In The Call by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Let Him In by Vishnu J Mohan
- Владимир Британишский – По Иртышу
- Teach Us To Number Our Days by Rita Dove
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- Hand Dark
- Granny
- Future Verdict
- Easter Decorations
- Dawnlight On The Sea
- Dawn
- Dawn God039s Sabbath
- Candle Lord
- By The Camp Fire
- By A Norfolk Broad
- Baptistry
- Aunt Dorothys Lecture
- At Sea
- At Long Last
- An Old Doll
- An Anniversary
- All Saints Day 1868
- All Saints Day 1867
- After Our Likeness
- A Story At Dusk
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works
