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:
- Владимир Маяковский – Порт
- A DARK HOUSE by Satish Verma
- Юлия Друнина – В голом парке коченеют клёны
- The Beginning by Rabindranath Tagore
- Robert Burns: On Seeing Mrs. Kemble In Yarico:
- Flamenco Flamingo by Ross D Tyler
- The Wicked Postman by Rabindranath Tagore
- Robert Burns: The Laddie’s Dear Sel’:
- The Rape of the Lock poem – Alexander Pope
- Roar Shack poem – Alice Fulton
- Unloved, unmoved by Maria Jastine Golo
- Sonnet 15: When I consider every thing that grows by William Shakespeare
- The Hope of the Resurrection by Vachel Lindsay
- The Lute Player Of Casa Blanca
- Pegasus at Wanlockhead by Robert Burns
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
- Last night my soul cried O exalted sphere of Heaven by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Laila and the Khalifa by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Intrigued with Evening by Jelaluddin Rumi
- In the Waters of Purity by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- In the End by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- In The Arc Of Your Mallet by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- If A Tree Could Wander by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I Swear by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I See so Deeply Within Myself by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I Have a Fire for You in my Mouth by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I have fallen into unconsciousness by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I have fallen into unconsciousness by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I have been tricked by flying too close by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I have been tricked by flying too close by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I Have a Fire for You in my Mouth by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I closed my eyes to creation by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I closed my eyes to creation by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I am a sculptor, a molder of form by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I Am Part Of The Load by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- I Am Part Of The Load by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
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