A poem by Adrienne Cecile Rich (1929 – 2012)
1.
Sex, as they harshly call it,
I fell into this morning
at ten o’clock, a drizzling hour
of traffic and wet newspapers.
I thought of him who yesterday
clearly didn’t
turn me to a hot field
ready for plowing,
and longing for that young man
pierced me to the roots
bathing every vein, etc.
All day he appears to me
touchingly desirable,
a prize one could wreck one’s peace for.
I’d call it love if love
didn’t take so many years
but lust too is a jewel
a sweet flower and what
pure happiness to know
all our high-toned questions
breed in a lively animal.
2.
That “old last act”!
And yet sometimes
all seems post coitum triste
and I a mere bystander.
Somebody else is going off,
getting shot to the moon.
Or a moon-race!
Split seconds after
my opposite number lands
I make it–
we lie fainting together
at a crater-edge
heavy as mercury in our moonsuits
till he speaks–
in a different language
yet one I’ve picked up
through cultural exchanges…
we murmur the first moonwords:
Spasibo. Thanks. O.K.

A few random poems:
- Алишер Навои – Поучительные заветы старости
- The Portrait by Siegfried Sassoon
- Lamp Of Love by Rabindranath Tagore
- English Poetry. Madison Julius Cawein. Finale. Мэдисон Джулиус Кавейн.
- English Poetry. Thomas Moore. From “The Odes of Anacreon”. Ode 56. Томас Мур.
- Spring & Fall: To A Young Child by Ted Hughes
- On The Tomb Of A Priestess Of Artemis by Sappho
- The Heritage by Siegfried Sassoon
- The Carter by William Barnes
- Taita Falcon above the Zambezi by Tom Mukasa
- Юлия Друнина – Елка
- Lincoln by Vachel Lindsay
- Swallows by Richard Schiffman
- Poppies In October by Sylvia Plath
- Erin, Oh Erin by Thomas Moore
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
- Hear the Voice by William Blake
- Introduction to the Songs of Innocence by William Blake
- French Revolution, The (excerpt) by William Blake
- I Saw a Chapel by William Blake
- I Heard an Angel by William Blake
- Broken Love by William Blake
- Eternity by William Blake
- Holy Thursday (Innocence) by William Blake
- Ah! Sun-Flower by William Blake
- A Cradle Song by William Blake
- Earth’s Answer by William Blake
- A Dream by William Blake
- Infant Joy by William Blake
- Evening Star by William Blake
- Auguries Of Innocence by William Blake
- And Did Those Feet In Ancient Time by William Blake
- Infant Sorrow by William Blake
- If It Is True What the Prophets Write by William Blake
- How Sweet I Roam’d by William Blake
- Holy Thursday (Experience) by William Blake
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
Adrienne Cecile Rich (1929 – 2012) was an American poet, essayist, and feminist.