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:
- Ship Starting, The. by Walt Whitman
- Poem on Sensibility by Robert Burns
- Pigeon Haiku by Violet Uram
- St. Winefred’s Well poem – Gerard Manley Hopkins poems
- Eating a Wampee by Piera Chen
- God Is Good by John Oxenham
- Where Shall We Go? by Vernon Scannell
- Azure and Gold poem – Amy Lowell poems | Poems and Poetry
- Как Снегурочка дела
- The Island by Milton Acorn
- Poetic Justice by Robby Charters
- Низами Гянджеви – Ты рукой мне сжала сердце
- In A Classroom
- Composed By The Sea-Side, Near Calais, August 1802 by William Wordsworth
- sadness from the night by Raj Arumugam
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
- Bantams In Pine-Woods by Wallace Stevens
- Gray Room by Wallace Stevens
- A Postcard From The Volcano by Wallace Stevens
- A High-Toned Old Christian Woman by Wallace Stevens
- A Rabbit As King Of The Ghosts by Wallace Stevens
- Final Soliloquy Of The Interior Paramour by Wallace Stevens
- Domination Of Black by Wallace Stevens
- Disillusionment Of Ten O’clock by Wallace Stevens
- Anecdote Of The Jar by Wallace Stevens
- Not Ideas About The Thing But The Thing Itself by Wallace Stevens
- Metaphors Of A Magnifico by Wallace Stevens
- Looking Across The Fields And Watching The Birds Fly by Wallace Stevens
- Life Is Motion by Wallace Stevens
- Le Monocle de Mon Oncle by Wallace Stevens
- Infanta Marina by Wallace Stevens
- Hymn From A Watermelon Pavilion by Wallace Stevens
- Gubbinal by Wallace Stevens
- Frogs Eat Butterflies, Snakes Eat Frogs, Hogs Eat Snakes, Men Eat Hogs by Wallace Stevens
- Farewell To Florida by Wallace Stevens
- Fabliau Of Florida by Wallace Stevens
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.