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:
- I’ve Got a Golden Ticket by Roald Dahl
- The Pity Of Love by William Butler Yeats
- Алексей Плещеев – Есть дни, ни злоба, ни любовь
- Николай Гумилев – Кенгуру
- Chronicle
- Niobe in Distress by Phillis Wheatley
- Омар Хайям – Из допущенных в рай и повергнутых в ад
- Владимир Степанов – Осы
- Farmers Market by Mary TallMountain
- Владимир Маяковский – Реклама журнала “Огонек”
- Robert Burns: Halloween: The following poem will, by many readers, be well enough understood; but for the sake of those who are unacquainted with the manners and traditions of the country where the scene is cast, notes are added to give some account of the principal charms and spells of that night, so big with prophecy to the peasantry in the west of Scotland. The passion of prying into futurity makes a striking part of the history of human nature in its rude state, in all ages and nations; and it may be some entertainment to a philosophic mind, if any such honour the author with a perusal, to see the remains of it among the more unenlightened in our own.-R.B.
- Robert Burns: Mark Yonder Pomp Of Costly Fashion:
- Inscription For A Hermitage In The Author’s Garden by William Cowper
- A Painting Morning
- Eavesdropping myself by Vladimir Marku
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
- On The High Price Of Fish by William Cowper
- On the Grasshopper (From The Greek) by William Cowper
- On The Death Of The Bishop Of Ely. Anno Aet. 17. (Translated From Milton) by William Cowper
- On The Death Of Mrs. Throckmorton’s Bullfinch by William Cowper
- On The Death Of Damon. (Translated From Milton) by William Cowper
- On The Benefit Received By His Majesty From Sea-Bathing, In The Year 1789 by William Cowper
- On The Author Of Letters On Literature by William Cowper
- On The Astrologers (From The Greek) by William Cowper
- On Receiving Heyne’s Virgil From Mr. Hayley by William Cowper
- On Receiving Hayley’s Picture by William Cowper
- On Receipt Of My Mother’s Picture by William Cowper
- On Pedigree. From Epicharmus by William Cowper
- On Pallas Bathing, From A Hymn Of Callimachus by William Cowper
- On One Ignorant And Arrogant (Translated From Owen) by William Cowper
- On Observing Some Names Of Little Note Recorded In The Biographia Britannica by William Cowper
- On Niobe (From The Greek) by William Cowper
- On Mrs. Montague’s Feather Hangings by William Cowper
- On Miltiades by William Cowper
- On Late Acquired Wealth (From The Greek) by William Cowper
- On Invalids (From The Greek) by William Cowper
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