Told
by Philip Levine
The air lay soffly on the green fur
of the almond, it was April
and I said, I begin again
but my hands burned in the damp earth
the light ran between my fingers
a black light like no other
this was not home, the linnet
settling on the oleander
the green pod swelling
the leaf slowly untwisting
the slashed egg fallen from the nest
the tongue of grass tasting
I was being told by a pulse slowing
in the eyes
the dove mourning in shadow
a nerve waking in the groin
the distant hills
turning their white heads away
told by the clouds assembling
in the trees, told by the blooming
of a black mouth beneath the rose
the worm sobbing, the dust
settling on my eyelid, told
by salt, by water, told and told.
End of the poem
15 random poems
- Низами Гянджеви – Не горюй, ибо друг есть
- Evening wind by Yosa Buson
- Crossroads by Roger Hayes
- Wake Not for the World-Heard Thunder poem – A. E. Housman
- Rubber Souls poem – Andrei Voznesensky poems
- Inscription to Jessie Lewars by Robert Burns
- A Man Young And Old: X. His Wildness by William Butler Yeats
- Ольга Высотская – Звёздочки
- Иван Елагин – Спрашивал ответа
- Владимир Солоухин – У моря
- Зинаида Александрова – Топотушки
- East Idioms (1): A Fable by Mike Yuan
- Book First [Introduction-Childhood and School Time] by William Wordsworth
- Sonnet 137: Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes by William Shakespeare
- Revelation
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).
Philip Levine ( 1928 – 2015) was an American poet best known for his poems about working-class Detroit. He taught for more than thirty years in the English department of California State University, Fresno and held teaching positions at other universities as well. He served on the Board of Chancellors of the Academy of American Poets from 2000 to 2006, and was appointed Poet Laureate of the United States for 2011–2012