The relatives are leaning over, staring expectantly.
They moisten their lips with their tongues. I can feel
them urging me on. I hold the baby in the air.
Heaps of broken bottles glitter in the sun.
A small band is playing old fashioned marches.
My mother is keeping time by stamping her foot.
My father is kissing a woman who keeps waving
to somebody else. There are palm trees.
The hills are spotted with orange flamboyants and tall
billowy clouds move beyond them. “Go on, Boy,”
I hear somebody say, “Go on.”
I keep wondering if it will rain.
The sky darkens. There is thunder.
“Break his legs,” says one of my aunts,
“Now give him a kiss.” I do what I’m told.
The trees bend in the bleak tropical wind.
The baby did not scream, but I remember that sigh
when I reached inside for his tiny lungs and shook them
out in the air for the flies. The relatives cheered.
It was about that time I gave up.
Now, when I answer the phone, his lips
are in the receiver; when I sleep, his hair is gathered
around a familiar face on the pillow; wherever I search
I find his feet. He is what is left of my life.
End of the poem
15 random poems
- Composed While The Author Was Engaged In Writing A Tract Occasioned By The Convention Of Cintra by William Wordsworth
- Portrait d’Une Femme poem – Ezra Pound poems
- The Flower-Fed Buffaloes by Vachel Lindsay
- John Barleycorn: A Ballad by Robert Burns
- Come not when I am dead poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems
- Study in Hands by Théophile Gautier
- REGENERATING by Satish Verma
- Иван Мятлев – Бывало
- Epitaph for Mr. Gabriel Richardson, Brewer by Robert Burns
- seaport.html
- Today’s News by Ted Berrigan
- Composed Near Calais, On The Road Leading To Ardres, August 7, 1802 by William Wordsworth
- Surf Song
- Олег Бундур – Первый пирог
- Валерий Брюсов – In hас lackimarum valle (в этой долине слез )
Some external links:
Duckduckgo.com – the alternative in the US
Quant.com – a search engine from France, and also an alternative, at least for Europe
Yandex – the Russian search engine (it’s probably the best search engine for image searches).
