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:
- Низами Гянджеви – Лейли и Меджнун
- Disabled by Wilfred Owen
- Ballade Of Dead Ladies poem – Andrew Lang poems
- A Bucolic Betwixt Two; Lacon and Thyrsis by Robert Herrick
- Зинаида Александрова – Давайте, девочки, купаться
- Snarleyow by Rudyard Kipling
- A Carol of Harvest, for 1867 by Walt Whitman
- Владимир Ладыженский – Христос Воскрес, скворцы поют
- Николай Глазков – Эпилог
- Impromptu Lines to Captain Riddell by Robert Burns
- Content Written Off Ithica poem – Alfred Austin
- Not my poem
- Sleep by Russell Edson
- On Glenriddell’s Fox breaking his chain: A Fragment by Robert Burns
- Base of all Metaphysics, The. 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
- Cold Eyes by Vaishnavi Prakash
- Bridesmaid From Rio by Vaishnavi Prakash
- Bottles Of Sunshine by Vaishnavi Prakash
- Bliss Of Eternity by Vaishnavi Prakash
- A Stepmother’s Vain Love by Vaishnavi Prakash
- A Slice Of School by Vaishnavi Prakash
- A Palanquin Of Love by Vaishnavi Prakash
- a deceving reflection by vanessa anderson
- The Tenants Of The Little Box by Vasko Popa
- The Judges Of The Little Box by Vasko Popa
- The Admirers Of The Little Box by Vasko Popa
- Far Within Us #6 by Vasko Popa
- Give Me Back My Rags #4 by Vasko Popa
- Far Within Us #7 by Vasko Popa
- Far Within Us #3 by Vasko Popa
- Far Within Us #2 by Vasko Popa
- Give Me Back My Rags #1 by Vasko Popa
- Between Games by Vasko Popa
- Anne Pennington by Vasko Popa
- Give Me Back My Rags #11 by Vasko Popa
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.