Burning Oneself Out

A poem by Adrienne Cecile Rich (1929 – 2012)

We can look into the stove tonight

as into a mirror, yes,

the serrated log, the yellow-blue gaseous core

the crimson-flittered grey ash, yes.

I know inside my eyelids

and underneath my skin

Time takes hold of us like a draft

upward, drawing at the heats

in the belly, in the brain

You told me of setting your hand

into the print of a long-dead Indian

and for a moment, I knew that hand,

that print, that rock,

the sun producing powerful dreams

A word can do this

or, as tonight, the mirror of the fire

of my mind, burning as if it could go on

burning itself, burning down

feeding on everything

till there is nothing in life

that has not fed that fire

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Poems in English 

• The Fascination Of What’s Difficult by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Falling Of The Leaves by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Everlasting Voices by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Double Vision Of Michael Robartes by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Dolls by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Delphic Oracle Upon Plotinus by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Dawn by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Dancer At Cruachan And Cro-Patrick by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Curse Of Cromwell by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Crazed Moon by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Countess Cathleen In Paradise by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Coming Of Wisdom With Time by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Cold Heaven by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Cloak, The Boat And The Shoes by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Circus Animals’ Desertion by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Choice by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Chambermaid’s First Song by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Chambermaid’s Second Song by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The Peacock by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats
• The O’Rahilly by William Butler Yeats by William Butler Yeats

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Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)

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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.

 

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