A poem by Adrienne Cecile Rich (1929 – 2012)
When the ice starts to shiver
all across the reflecting basin
or water-lily leaves
dissect a simple surface
the word ‘drowning’ flows through me.
You built a glassy floor
that held me
as I leaned to fish for old
hooks and toothed tin cans,
stems lashing out like ties of
silk dressing-gowns
archangels of lake-light
gripped in mud.
Now you hand me a torn letter.
On my knees, in the ashes, I could never
fit these ripped-up flakes together.
In the taxi I am still piecing
what syllables I can
translating at top speed like a thinking machine
that types out ‘useless’ as ‘monster’
and ‘history’ as ‘lampshade’.
Crossing the bridge I need all my nerve
to trust to the man-made cables.
The blades on that machine
could cut you to ribbons
but its function is humane.
Is this all I can say of these
delicate books, scythe-curved intentions
you and I handle? I’d rather
taste blood, yours or mine, flowing
from a sudden slash, than cut all day
with blunt scissors on dotted lines
like the teacher told.
A few random poems:
- Олег Бундур – Ближе к снегу
- Sonnet (IX) : Flesh o flesh ! The momentous , the mortal , the doomed by Neelam Sinha
- On An Infant (From The Greek) by William Cowper
- Владимир Маяковский – Все на фронт добровольцами! Пока… (РОСТА)
- Низами Гянджеви – Расступился черный мускус
- Владимир Британишский – Унифицированный современный поэт
- In Imitation of Dr. Swift : The Happy Life of a Country Parson poem – Alexander Pope
- Василий Жуковский – На первое отречение от престола Бонапарте
- Нина Гаген-Торн – Барак ночью
- Sonnet 33: Full many a glorious morning have I seen by William Shakespeare
- On The Decline Of Oracles by Sylvia Plath
- Gus: The Theatre Cat by T. S. Eliot
- Огюст Барбье – Ни кротостью, ни негой ясной
- Living in my Bliss by Nina Gabriel
- Beat! Beat! Drums! by Walt Whitman
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
- Cologne by Paul Celan
- Canal Bank Walk by Patrick Kavanagh
- Brooklyn Narcissus by Paul Blackburn
- Braga by Walid Saba
- Bistro Memories by P.J.Reed
- Bicycle Ride by Pat Mullan
- AUTUMN GRAPES by Önder Kurt
- Autumn by P. K. Page
- And Then It Rained by Pamela Griffiths
- Alameda by Paul Blackburn
- After Rain by P. K. Page
- Advent by Patrick Kavanagh
- Adolescence by P. K. Page
- Addiction by Walid Saba
- A Silent Song by Pamela Griffiths
- A Crimson Carpet by Pamela Griffiths
- A Cat Called Shan by Pamela Griffiths
- Your Words by Piera Chen
- Your souls are ours by Philo Ikonya
- You Are Mine by Pushpendra Singh Baghel
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.