A poem by Adrienne Cecile Rich (1929 – 2012)
If I’ve reached for your lines (I have)
like letters from the dead that stir the nerves
dowsed you for a springhead
to water my thirst
dug into my compost skeletons and petals
you surely meant to catch the light:
-at work in my wormeaten wormwood-raftered
stateless underground
have I a plea?
If I’ve touched your finger
with a ravenous tongue
licked from your palm a rift of salt
if I’ve dreamt or thought you
a pack of blood fresh-drawn
hanging darkred from a hook
higher than my heart
(you who understand transfusion)
where else should I appeal?
A pilot light lies low
while the gas jets sleep
(a cat getting toed from stove
into nocturnal ice)
language uncommon and agile as truth
melts down the most intractable silence
A lighthouse keeper’s ethics:
you tend for all or none
for this you might set your furniture on fire
A this we have blundered over
as if the lamp could be shut off at will
rescue denied for some
and still a lighthouse be
A few random poems:
- The Call of the Crows by Tanmoy
- Lament for the Makers by William Dunbar
- Владимир Высоцкий – Солдат и привидение
- Sonnet 21: So is it not with me as with that muse by William Shakespeare
- Vaudracour And Julia by William Wordsworth
- Aunt Helen by T. S. Eliot
- Жан Расин – Британик
- Robert Burns: Gudewife, Count The Lawin:
- Алишер Навои – Уже белеет голова
- The Bell From Europe by Weldon Kees
- An Imperial Elegy by Wilfred Owen
- Stepping Backward
- These Are The Clouds by William Butler Yeats
- The Bwoat by William Barnes
- Омар Хайям – Несовместимых мы порой полны желаний
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
- Call It Music by Philip Levine
- Black Stone On Top Of Nothing by Philip Levine
- Bitterness by Philip Levine
- Berenda Slough by Philip Levine
- Belle Isle, 1949 by Philip Levine
- At Bessemer by Philip Levine
- Any Night by Philip Levine
- Another Song by Philip Levine
- Animals Are Passing From Our Lives by Philip Levine
- An Abandoned Factory, Detroit by Philip Levine
- Among Children by Philip Levine
- A Woman Waking by Philip Levine
- A Theory Of Prosody by Philip Levine
- A Sleepless Night by Philip Levine
- Sonnet III: With how sad steps by Sir Philip Sidney
- Sonnet II: Not At First Sight by Sir Philip Sidney
- Sonnet I: Loving In Truth by Sir Philip Sidney
- Song from Arcadia by Sir Philip Sidney
- Song by Sir Philip Sidney
- Sleep by Sir Philip Sidney
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
Adrienne Cecile Rich (1929 – 2012) was an American poet, essayist, and feminist.