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 – Два Берлина
- Владимир Высоцкий – Странные скачки
- Robert Burns: The Ordination : For sense they little owe to frugal Heav’n- To please the mob, they hide the little giv’n.
- A Pastoral Upon The Birth of Prince Charles: Presented to the King, and Set by Mr Nic. Laniere by Robert Herrick
- Олег Сердобольский – Кузнечик
- The Turn O’ The Days by William Barnes
- A Coat by William Butler Yeats
- Олег Бундур – Всё живёт
- Олег Бундур – Дедушка воспитывает папу
- A Stone Is Nobody’s by Russell Edson
- Freddy by Stevie Smith
- Шарль Бодлер – Жажда небытия
- Sonnet Ix
- Passage to India. by Walt Whitman
- Unrequited Love – Why Can’t You Love Me Back?
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
- Poem of Joys. by Walt Whitman
- Proud Music of The Storm by Walt Whitman
- Here, Sailor. by Walt Whitman
- I Dream’d in a Dream. by Walt Whitman
- Turn, O Libertad. by Walt Whitman
- A Clear Midnight. by Walt Whitman
- Are You the New person, drawn toward Me? by Walt Whitman
- Ah Poverties, Wincings and Sulky Retreats. by Walt Whitman
- Soledad by Robert Hayden
- Runagate Runagate by Robert Hayden
- Perseus by Robert Hayden
- O Daedalus, Fly Away Home by Robert Hayden
- Among the Multitude. by Walt Whitman
- American Feuillage. by Walt Whitman
- An Army Corps on the March. by Walt Whitman
- All is Truth. by Walt Whitman
- A Carol of Harvest, for 1867 by Walt Whitman
- A Promise to California. by Walt Whitman
- After the Sea-Ship. by Walt Whitman
- A Boston Ballad, 1854. by Walt Whitman
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
