A poem by Alan Dugan
Who knows whether the sea heals or corrodes?
The wading, wintered pack-beasts of the feet
slough off, in spring, the dead rind of the shoes’
leather detention, the big toe’s yellow horn
shines with a natural polish, and the whole
person seems to profit. The opposite appears
when dead sharks wash up along the beach
for no known reason. What is more built
for winning than the swept-back teeth,
water-finished fins, and pure bad eyes
these old, efficient forms of appetite
are dressed in? Yet it looks as if the sea
digested what it wished of them with viral ease
and threw up what was left to stink and dry.
If this shows how the sea approaches life
in its propensity to feed as animal entire,
then sharks are comforts, feet are terrified,
but they vacation in the mystery and why not?
Who knows whether the sea heals or corrodes?:
what the sun burns up of it, the moon puts back.

A few random poems:
- Seasons by Tala Bar
- Sonnet 15 poem – John Milton poems
- Владимир Бенедиктов – Когда вдали от суеты всемирной
- Владимир Бенедиктов – Не трать огня напрасных убеждений
- Robert Burns: Written By Somebody On The Window Of an Inn at Stirling, on seeing the Royal Palace in ruin.: Of an Inn at Stirling, on seeing the Royal Palace in ruin.
- A Comparison by William Cowper
- Алексей Плещеев – Сон
- To A Clergyman On The Death Of His Lady by Phillis Wheatley
- Алишер Навои – Пустословя на минбаре
- Argus poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Джон Мильтон – О своей слепоте
- Владимир Бенедиктов – Развалины
- Федор Сологуб – Ландыши, ландыши, бедные цветы
- Instead of farewell by Vinko Kalinić
- My Mother On An Evening In Late Summer by Mark Strand
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
- Sacrifice And Love
- Rule I By Eric Mottram Stop Writing Literature You Garrulous Indian
- Poetry And Politics
- Poem Stories
- Plato
- Peace Universal Good
- Paralipomemnon
- Our Refuge
- One Sweet White Light
- New Land
- Motionless Body
- Mother
- Minimalism And The Elm Choka
- Mark
- Love Flower
- Love
- Lord God Have Mercy On Me
- Libation
- Least In A List
- Interpret The Light
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
Alan Dugan (1923 – 2003) an American poet, a contemporary classic of American poetry.