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:
- Apostroph. by Walt Whitman
- Нина Воронель – Неделю, как сотню, лучше не трогать
- Fragment—Her Flwoing Locks by Robert Burns
- Яков Полонский – Последний вздох
- The Man Into Whose Yard You Should Not Hit Your Ball by Thomas Lux
- The Woodlands by William Barnes
- Вера Павлова – Объятье
- Яков Полонский – Одному из усталых
- Logos poem – Aleister Crowley poems | Poetry Monster
- Robert Burns: To A Louse: On Seeing One On A Lady’s Bonnet, At Church
- Михаил Лермонтов – Вечер после дождя
- The Heart’s House by Sara Teasdale
- The Tale of the Tiger-Tree by Vachel Lindsay
- Михаил Кузмин – Вот после ржавых львов и рева
- This Month The Almonds Bloom At Kandahar
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
- A Song of Enchantment by Walter de la Mare
- Nicholas Nye by Walter de la Mare
- Napoleon by Walter de la Mare
- Arabia by Walter de la Mare
- An Epitaph by Walter de la Mare
- To His Love When He Had Obtained Her by Sir Walter Raleigh
- To a Lady with an Unruly and Ill-mannered Dog Who Bit several Persons of Importance by Sir Walter Raleigh
- The Silent Lover ii by Sir Walter Raleigh
- The Silent Lover i by Sir Walter Raleigh
- The Nymph’s Reply To The Shepherd by Sir Walter Raleigh
- The Lie by Sir Walter Raleigh
- The Conclusion by Sir Walter Raleigh
- The Artist by Sir Walter Raleigh
- Stans Puer ad Mensam by Sir Walter Raleigh
- Song of Myself by Sir Walter Raleigh
- Sestina Otiosa by Sir Walter Raleigh
- Now What Is Love by Sir Walter Raleigh
- On Being Challenged to Write an Epigram in the Manner of Herrick by Sir Walter Raleigh
- Nature that Washed Her Hands in Milk by Sir Walter Raleigh
- My Last Will by Sir Walter Raleigh
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