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:
- The City Limits poem – A. R. Ammons poems | Poetry Monster
- Milagros Retenidos poem – Ana Chig poems | Poems and Poetry
- A Poem to my Beloved by Walter William Safar
- Альфред Теннисон – Королева мая
- For Sidney Bechet by Philip Larkin
- Mowgli’s Song Against People by Rudyard Kipling
- “`Covet who will the patronage of Kings ” poem – Alfred Austin
- Dead Men’s Love by Rupert Brooke
- I have fallen into unconsciousness by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- A Sculptor’s Vow by Nikhil Srinivas
- Владимир Высоцкий – Неужто здесь сошёлся клином свет
- Last Sonnet poem – John Keats poems
- market_square.html
- Apples of Hesperides poem – Amy Lowell poems | Poems and Poetry
- Among the Rocks by Robert Browning
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 Channel Passage by Rupert Brooke
- 1914 V: The Soldier by Rupert Brooke
- 1914 IV: The Dead by Rupert Brooke
- 1914 III: The Dead by Rupert Brooke
- 1914 II: Safety by Rupert Brooke
- 1914 I: Peace by Rupert Brooke
- When Day Is Done by Rabindranath Tagore
- When and Why by Rabindranath Tagore
- Vocation by Rabindranath Tagore
- Untimely Leave by Rabindranath Tagore
- Twelve O’Clock by Rabindranath Tagore
- Threshold by Rabindranath Tagore
- The Wicked Postman by Rabindranath Tagore
- The Unheeded Pageant by Rabindranath Tagore
- The Source by Rabindranath Tagore
- The Sailor by Rabindranath Tagore
- The Recall by Rabindranath Tagore
- The Rainy Day by Rabindranath Tagore
- The Lotus by Rabindranath Tagore
- The Little Big Man by Rabindranath Tagore
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.