A poem by Adrienne Cecile Rich (1929 – 2012)
Far back when I went zig-zagging
through tamarack pastures
you were my genius, you
my cast-iron Viking, my helmed
lion-heart king in prison.
Years later now you’re young
my fierce half-brother, staring
down from that simplified west
your breast open, your belt dragged down
by an oldfashioned thing, a sword
the last bravado you won’t give over
though it weighs you down as you stride
and the stars in it are dim
and maybe have stopped burning.
But you burn, and I know it;
as I throw back my head to take you in
and old transfusion happens again:
divine astronomy is nothing to it.
Indoors I bruise and blunder
break faith, leave ill enough
alone, a dead child born in the dark.
Night cracks up over the chimney,
pieces of time, frozen geodes
come showering down in the grate.
A man reaches behind my eyes
and finds them empty
a woman’s head turns away
from my head in the mirror
children are dying my death
and eating crumbs of my life.
Pity is not your forte.
Calmly you ache up there
pinned aloft in your crow’s nest,
my speechless pirate!
You take it all for granted
and when I look you back
it’s with a starlike eye
shooting its cold and egotistical spear
where it can do least damage.
Breath deep! No hurt, no pardon
out here in the cold with you
you with your back to the wall.
A few random poems:
- dance of life by Raj Arumugam
- The Cup of Life by Mike Yuan
- Soul Receives From Soul by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Middlesex poem – John Betjeman poems
- Lines to John M’Murdo of Drumlanrig by Robert Burns
- Death by Thomas Hood
- Ольга Седакова – Легенда шестая
- Harrow-on-the-Hill poem – John Betjeman poems | Poems and Poetry
- Sweet Music In The Wind by William Barnes
- Where My Sight Goes by Yvor Winters
- Валерий Брюсов – Фламандцам
- Валерий Брюсов – И. Туманьяну надпись на книге (Да будет праведно возмездие)
- Валерий Брюсов – Идеал
- Epigram at Brownhill Inn by Robert Burns
- When Runnels Began To Leap And Sing poem – Alfred Austin
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
- Book Leaf by Shaunna Harper
- Blue Period by Shaunna Harper
- Amoraphobia by Shaunna Harper
- A Eulogy by Shaunna Harper
- Welcome To My World © by Shannen Wrass
- Time Out To Cry by Shannen Wrass
- The Wrath of Love by Shawn Ervin
- The Voice of Woman by Shahida Latif
- The Victory by Shahida Latif
- The Spring passing away by Shailendra Chauhan
- The Ineffectual Dives by Shahida Latif
- The Earth Trembles by Shahida Latif
- The Demon by Shawn Ervin
- The Callous Statues by Shahida Latif
- Sheppard’s Quest by Shawn Ervin
- Selfish World, Selfish People by Shahbaz Khan
- Repentance by Shailendra Chauhan
- “Wishing to float” by Seema Gupta
- Serendipity by Seema Gupta
- Tiny Warrior by Sharmagne Leland-St. John
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.