Prison Song

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.

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Poems in English 

• The First Part: Sonnet 10 – Fair Moon, who with thy cold and silver shine by William Drummond by Anglo File
• The First Part: Sonnet 1 – In my first years, and prime yet not at height by William Drummond by Anglo File
• The Editor by William Ellery Leonard by Anglo File
• The Book Of The World by William Drummond by Anglo File
• The Beggar by William Ellery Leonard by Anglo File
• Reading by William Marr by Anglo File
• Premature Blindness by Winston Riley by Anglo File
• May-Night by William Ellery Leonard by Anglo File
• Man’s Knowledge – Ingorance in the Mysteries of God by William Drummond by Anglo File
• Indian Summer by William Ellery Leonard by Anglo File
• In the Small Hours by Wole Soyinka by Anglo File
• In Christ there is No East Or West by John Oxenham by Anglo File
• His Mercy Endureth For Ever by John Oxenham by Anglo File
• Harp Song of the Dane Women by Rudyard Kipling by Anglo File
• God Is Good by John Oxenham by Anglo File
• Gadara, A.D. 31 by John Oxenham by Anglo File
• Freemen by John Oxenham by Anglo File
• Free Men Of God by John Oxenham by Anglo File
• For the Men at the Front by John Oxenham by Anglo File
• Flowers Of The Dust by John Oxenham by Anglo File

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