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:
- If You Ask Me by Miraj Patel
- Words Unspoken by Mark Olynyk
- Иван Бунин – Норд-ост
- Sitting Beside The Very Street by Nijole Miliauskaite
- Владимир Бенедиктов – К женщине
- On the Road to Nowhere by Vachel Lindsay
- Юргис Балтрушайтис – На улице
- Epistle from Mr. Somerville, An by William Somervile
- Cromwell’s Return poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- Cinderella by Roald Dahl
- Ruth by Thomas Hood
- Epitaph on the same by Robert Burns
- Георгий Иванов – Аспазия, всегда Аспазия
- Василий Казин – Ожидание
- Doggerel by a Senior Citizen by W H Auden
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
- The Incurious Bencher by William Somervile
- The Hip by William Somervile
- The Happy Lunatic by William Somervile
- The Frog’s Choice by William Somervile
- The Dog and the Bear by William Somervile
- The Devil Outwitted by William Somervile
- The Coquette by William Somervile
- The Captive Trumpeter by William Somervile
- The Busy Indolent by William Somervile
- The Bowling-Green by William Somervile
- The Bald-Pated Welshman and the Fly by William Somervile
- Song by William Somervile
- On Presenting to a Lady a White Rose and a Red on the Tenth of June by William Somervile
- On Miranda’s Leaving the Country by William Somervile
- Mahomet Ali Beg; Or, the Faithful Minister of State by William Somervile
- Liberty, and Love; or, the Two Sparrows by William Somervile
- Hunting Song by William Somervile
- Hudibras and Milton Reconciled by William Somervile
- Hobbinol; or The Rural Games by William Somervile
- Hobbinol; or The Rural Games – Canto 3 by William Somervile
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.