To make sure
You have not said:
“I love you,”
They smell your breath.
They even smell your heart
Trying times are these, my darling.
They flog love
Tied to the post of the cul-de-sac
We must hide love in the closet.
In this serpentine maze
This crooked cold corner
They feed the fire
With poems and songs
Thinking, too, is risky.
Those who, late at night, knock on the door,
Are there to kill the lamp.
We must hide the light in the closet.
Then there are the butchers
Stationed at all cross-roads,
Armed with a block and a bloody cleaver.
Trying times these are, my darling.
Surgically,
They plant smiles on lips,
And songs in the mouths.
We must hide joy in the closet.
On lilies and lilacs,
They roast the canaries.
Trying times these are, my darling.
Drunk with victory, the Devil,
Celebrates our wake.
We must hide God in the closet.

A few random poems:
- About The Nightingale by Samuel Coleridge
- Sonnet 35: No more be grieved at that which thou hast done by William Shakespeare
- Владимир Корнилов – В прачечной
- A Prayer in Spring by Robert Frost
- Beans Taste Fine by Shel Silverstein
- Circus In Three Rings by Sylvia Plath
- Yankee Doodle by Vachel Lindsay
- Алексей Толстой – Вновь растворилась дверь
- Владимир Маяковский – Неразбериха
- Михаил Кузмин – Утешение
- The Pond poem – Amy Lowell poems | Poems and Poetry
- Black Cat by Rainer Maria Rilke
- Ольга Берггольц – Я иду по местам боев
- Sonnet 88: When thou shalt be disposed to set me light by William Shakespeare
- What the Ghost of the Gambler Said by Vachel Lindsay
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
- Medusa by Sylvia Plath
- Moonrise by Sylvia Plath
- Medallion by Sylvia Plath
- Mirror by Sylvia Plath
- Maudlin by Sylvia Plath
- Midsummer Mobile by Sylvia Plath
- Magnolia Shoals by Sylvia Plath
- Metaphors by Sylvia Plath
- Magi by Sylvia Plath
- Medusa by Sylvia Plath
- Maenad by Sylvia Plath
- Medallion by Sylvia Plath
- Lyonnesse by Sylvia Plath
- Maudlin by Sylvia Plath
- Lorelei by Sylvia Plath
- Magnolia Shoals by Sylvia Plath
- Little Fugue by Sylvia Plath
- Magi by Sylvia Plath
- Maenad by Sylvia Plath
- Lyonnesse by Sylvia Plath
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