A poem by Alan Dugan
The skin ripples over my body like moon-wooed water,
rearing to escape me. Where could it find another
animal as naked as the one it hates to cover?
Once it told me what was happening outside,
who was attacking, who caressing, and what the air
was doing to feed or freeze me. Now I wake up
dark at night, in a textureless ocean of ignorance,
or fruit bites back and water bruises like a stone.
It’s jealousy, because I look for other tools to know
with, and other armor, better girded to my wish.
So let it lie, turn off the clues or try to leave:
sewn on me seamless like those painful shirts
the body-hating saints wore, the sheath of hell
is pierced to my darkness nonetheless: what traitors
labor in my face, what hints they smuggle through
its arching guard! But even in the night it jails,
with nothing but its lies and silences to feed upon,
the jail itself can make a scenery, sing prison songs,
and set off fireworks to praise a homemade day.
A few random poems:
- Юлиан Анисимов – Стихи мои, нежные гости
- The Scythians poem – Aleksandr Blok poems | Poetry Monster
- We know this much by Sappho
- Across the Street from the Whitmore Home for Girls, 1949 by Rachel McKibbens
- Василий Жуковский – Библия
- Beloved Ireland by Walter William Safar
- Игорь Северянин – Шутливая рондель
- Владимир Высоцкий – Снова печь барахлит, тут рублей не жалей
- Владимир Набоков – Будь со мной прозрачнее и проще
- The Laws of God, The Laws of Man by A. E. Housman
- Devotion by Robert Frost
- Enoch Arden poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems
- A Pleäce In Zight by William Barnes
- The River Of Bees by W. S. Merwin
- Savantism. 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
- Olney Hymn 50: The Christian by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 5: Jehovah-Shalom: The Lord Send Peace by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 48: Joy And Peace In Believing by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 47: The Hidden Life by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 45: The Happy Change by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 43: Prayer For Patience by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 40: Peace After A Storm by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 4: Jehovah-Nissi: The Lord My Banner by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 39: The Valley Of The Shadow Of Death by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 38: Looking Upwards In A Storm by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 36: Afflictions Sanctified By The Word by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 34: The Waiting Soul by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 33: Seeking The Beloved by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 32: The Shining Light by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 31: On The Death Of A Minister by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 30: The Light And Glory Of The Word by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 3: Jehovah-Rophi: I Am the Lord That Healeth Thee by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 29: Exhortation To Prayer by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 28: Jesus Hasting To Suffer by William Cowper
- Olney Hymn 27: Welcome To The Table by William Cowper
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.