posted August 26, 2004 07:50 PM         

Who is your favourite writer of poetry and would you care to share a line or two?

I'll make a start.

T'was the dream of God
And the mould of his hand'
That you trembled and broke,
To this beautiful land.

Here he loosed from his hold
A brown tumult of wings
Till the wind on the sea
Bore a strange melody
Of an island that sings.

I have left you behind
In the path of the past
With the white breath of flowers
With the best of Gods hours,
I have left you at last.

Dora Sigerson.

posted August 26, 2004 08:25 PM         

There was a poet, I carried one of his verses in my purse for ages, it had touched me so. He's very old now, may even be deceased, and I haven't been able to recall his name in years.

Here's a favorite, by W.H. Auden

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.
###

Even mourning has beauty.

But just to balance things out...

Sick
by Shel Silverstein

"I cannot go to school today,"
Said little Peggy Ann McKay.
"I have the measles and the mumps,
A gash, a rash and purple bumps.
My mouth is wet, my throat is dry,
I'm going blind in my right eye.
My tonsils are as big as rocks,
I've counted sixteen chicken pox
And there's one more--that's seventeen,
And don't you think my face looks green?
My leg is cut--my eyes are blue--
It might be instamatic flu.
I cough and sneeze and gasp and choke,
I'm sure that my left leg is broke--
My hip hurts when I move my chin,
My belly button's caving in,
My back is wrenched, my ankle's sprained,
My 'pendix pains each time it rains.
My nose is cold, my toes are numb.
I have a sliver in my thumb.
My neck is stiff, my voice is weak,
I hardly whisper when I speak.
My tongue is filling up my mouth,
I think my hair is falling out.
My elbow's bent, my spine ain't straight,
My temperature is one-o-eight.
My brain is shrunk, I cannot hear,
There is a hole inside my ear.
I have a hangnail, and my heart is--what?
What's that? What's that you say?
You say today is. . .Saturday?
G'bye, I'm going out to play!"

###

posted August 26, 2004 08:37 PM         

Thanking you so much for sharing.

posted August 26, 2004 10:28 PM         

~ After All ~

....And yet I long for you,
I love you,
perhaps because I am too far away from you -
because evil is away from good;
perhaps because we are children
of two mallicious fates

...And yet I wait for you
I wait for you because I beleive in miracles,
in hope that we can reach Heaven and Earth;
because the soul alone
without faith
does never suffer

posted August 26, 2004 11:44 PM         

I read I'm unsure where, that poetry was the language of silence. If that is true, then how beautiful is that silence articulated. I think poetry is the infinity of my interior. It carries me away to secret places unseen.

Do you know Pablo Neruda? He writes some lovely love lines. It's light and airy stuff, however it always makes me smile.

"I will bring you happy flowers from the
mountains, blue bells, dark hazels, and
rustic baskets full of kisses. I want to do
to you what spring does to the cherry
trees."

Peyo's poem reminded me of this. I'm writing this down from memory so I hope I've not missed anything.

Griefs

I measure every grief I meet
with analytic eyes
I wonder if it weighs like mine,
or has an easier size.

I wonder if they bore it long,
or did it just begin?
I could not feel the date of mine,
It feels so old a pain.

I wonder if it hurts to live
And if they have to try,
And whether, could they choose between,
They would not rather die.

I wonder if when the years have piled
Some thousands on the cause
If such a lapse
Could give them any pause.

Or would they go on aching still
Through centuries above,
Enlightened to the larger pain
By contrast with the love.

There's a grief of want, and a grief of cold,
A sort they call "despair,"
There's a banishment from native eyes,
In sight of native air.

Though I may not guess the kind
correctly, yet to me
A piercing comfort it affords
In passing Calvary.

To note the fashions of the cross
Of those that stand alone
Still I'm fascinated to presume
That some are like my own.

Emily Dickinson.

posted August 27, 2004 12:37 AM         

one from Rilke ~

Interior Portrait

You don't survive in me
because of memories;
nor are you mine because
of a lovely longing's strength.

What does make you present
is the ardent detour
that a slow tenderness
traces in my blood.

I do not need
to see you appear;
being born sufficed for me
to lose you a little less.

Translated by A. Poulin

and few from from Denise Levertov

The Fountain

Don’t say, don’t say there is no water
to solace the dryness at our hearts.
I have seen

the fountain springing out of the rock wall
and you drinking there. And I too
before your eyes

found footholds and climbed
to drink the cool water.

The woman of that place, shading her eyes,
frowned as she watched—but not because
she grudged the water,

only because she was waiting
to see we drank our fill and were
refreshed.

Don’t say, don’t say there is no water.
That fountain is there among its scalloped
green and gray stones,

it is still there and always there
with its quiet song and strange power
to spring in us,
up and out through the rock.

The Elves

Elves are no smaller
than men, and walk
as men do, in this world,
but with more grace than most,
and are not immortal.

Their beauty sets them aside
from other men and from women
unless a woman has that cold fire in her
called poet: with that

she may see them and by its light
they know her and are not afraid
and silver tongues of love
flicker between them

Aware

When I found the door
I found the vine leaves
speaking among themselves in abundant
whispers.
My presence made them
hush their green breath,
embarrassed, the way
humans stand up, buttoning their jackets,
acting as if they were leaving anyway, as if
the conversation had ended
just before you arrived.
I liked
the glimpse I had, though,
of their obscure
gestures. I liked the sound
of such private voices. Next time
I'll move like cautious sunlight, open
the door by fractions, eavesdrop
peacefully.

Hymn To Eros

O Eros, silently smiling one, hear me.
Let the shadow of thy wings
brush me.
Let thy presence
enfold me, as if darkness
were swandown.
Let me see that darkness
lamp in hand,
this country become
the other country
sacred to desire.

Drowsy god,
slow the wheels of my thought
so that I listen only
to the snowfall hush of
thy circling.
Close my beloved with me
in the smoke ring of thy power,
that we way be, each to the other,
figures of flame,
figures of smoke,
figures of flesh
newly seen in the dusk.

i simply adore Theodore Roethke and John Donne also. William Carlos Williams holds a place on the list as well.

ahhh....poetry...breath of life.

posted August 27, 2004 12:48 AM         

I'm sitting here with tears streaming down my cheeks. I am so moved by "Aware" and
"Interior Portrait."

Thanking you so much. I'll be reading them again many times over.

posted August 27, 2004 01:10 AM         

THE HOST OF THE AIR

O'Driscoll drove with a song
The wild duck and the drake
From the tall and tufted reeds
Of the Drear Hart Lake.

And he saw how the reeds grew dark
At the coming of night tide
And dreamed of the long dim hair
Of Bridget his bride.

He heard while he sang and dreamed
A piper piping away,
And never was piping so sad
And never was piping so gay.

And he saw young men and young girls
Who danced on a level place,
And Bridget his bride among them
With sad and a gay face.

The dancers crowded about him
And many a sweet thing said,
And a young man brought him red wine
And a young girl white bread.

But, Bridget drew him by the sleeve
Away from merry bands
To old men playing at cards
With twinkling of ancient hands.

The bread and the wine had doom,
For these were the host of the air,
He sat and played in a dream
Of her long dim hair.

He played with merry old men
Thought not of evil chance,
Until one bore Bridget his bride
Away from the merry dance.

He bore her away in his arms
The handsomest young man there,
And his neck and his breast and his arms
Were drowned in her long dim hair.

O'Driscoll scattered the cards
And out of his dream awoke,
Old men and young men and young girls
Were gone like drifting smoke.

He heard high up in the air
A piper piping away,
And never was piping so sad,
And never was piping so gay.

W.B Yeats.

Gia

posted August 27, 2004 01:31 AM         

Rilke is good:

The Suicide's Song

So it's back once more, back up the slope.
Why do they always ruin my rope
With their cuts?
I felt so ready the other day,
Had a real foretaste of eternity
In my guts.

Spoonfeeding me yet another sip
From life's cup.
I don't want it, won't take any more of it,
Let me throw up.

Life is medium-rare and good, I see,
And the world full of soup and bread,
But it won't pass into the blood for me,
Just goes to my head.

It makes me ill, though others it feeds;
Do see that I must deny it!
For a thousand years from now at least
I'm keeping a diet.

But, My heart is really with the classic Sufi poet-mystics:

The Ruba'iyat of Omar Khayyam

1
Awake! For morning in the bowl of night
Has flung the stone that puts the stars to flight:
And lo! the hunter of the East has caught
The Sultan's turret in a noose of light.
4
Now the New Year reviving old desires,
The thoughtful soul to solitude retires,
Where the white hand of Moses on the bough
Puts out, and Jesus from the ground suspires.
11
With me along some strip of herbage strown,
That just divides the desert from the sown,
Where name of slave and sultan scarce is known,
And pity Sultan Mahmud on his throne.
20
I sometimes think that never blows so red,
The rose as where some buried Caesar bled;
That every hyacinth the garden wears
Dropt in its lap from some once lovely head.
24
Lo! some we loved, the loveliest and the best,
That time and fate of all their vintage prest,
Have drunk their cup a round or two before,
And one by one crept silently to rest.
25
And we that now make merry in the room
They left, and Summer dresses in new bloom,
Ourselves must we beneath the couch of earth
Descend, ourselves to make a couch - for whom?
28
Why, all the saints and sages who discuss'd
Of the two worlds so learnedly, are thrust
Like foolish prophets forth; their words to scorn
Are scatter'd, and their mouths are stopt with dust.
29
For let philosopher and doctor preach,
Of what they will and what they will not - each
Is but one link in an eternal chain,
That none can slip, nor break, nor over-reach.
31
Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and saint, and heard great argument
About it and about; but evermore
Came out by the same door as in I went.
32
With them the seed of wisdom did I sow
And with my own hand, labour'd it to grow:
And this was all the harvest that I reap'd -
'I came like water, and like wind I go.'
35
Up from Earth's center through the seventh gate
I rose, and on the throne of Saturn sate,
And many knots unravel'd by the road;
But not the knot of human death and fate.
43
Ah, fill the cup: - what boots it to repeat
How time is slipping underneath our feet:
Unborn tomorrow, and dead yesterday,
Why fret about them if today be sweet!
48
While the rose blows along the river brink,
With old Khayyam the ruby vintage drink:
And when the angel with his darker draught
Draws up to thee - take that, and do not shrink.
59
How long, how long in infinite pursuit
Of This and That endeavor and dispute?
Better be merry with the fruitful grape
Than sadden after none, or bitter, fruit.
60
You know, my friends, with what a brave carouse
I made a second marriage in my house;
Divorced old barren reason from my bed,
And took the daughter of the vine to spouse.
61
For 'is' and 'is-not' though with rule and line,
And 'up-and-down' by logic I define,
Of all that one should care to fathom, I
Was never deep in anything but - Wine.
64
The grape that can with logic absolute
The two-and-seventy jarring sects confute:
The subtle alchemist that in a trice
Life's leaden metal into gold transmute.
66
But leave the wise to wrangle, and with me
The quarrel of the universe let be:
And in some corner of the hubbub coucht,
Make game of that which makes as much of thee.
74
'Tis all a checker-board of nights and days
Where Destiny with men for pieces plays:
Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays,
And one by one back in the closet lays.
75
The ball no question makes of 'Aye's and 'No's,
But right or left as strikes the player goes;
And he that toss'd thee down into the field,
He knows about it all - HE knows - HE knows!
76
The moving finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy piety nor wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a line,
Nor all thy tears wash out a word of it.
77
And that inverted bowl we call the sky,
Whereunder crawling coop't we live and die,
Lift not thy hands to It for help - for It
Rolls impotently on as thou or I.
78
With Earth's first clay they did the first man's knead,
And then of the last harvest sow'd the seed:
Yea, the first morning of Creation wrote
What the last dawn of reckoning shall read.
82
And this I know: whether the one true light
Kindle to love, or wrath consume me quite,
One flash of it within the tavern caught
Better than in the temple lost outright.
83
What! out of senseless nothing to provoke
A conscious something to resent the yoke
Of unpermitted pleasure, under pain
Of everlasting penalties, if broke!
84
What! from this helpless creature be repaid
Pure gold for what he lent him dross-allay'd -
Sue for a debt he never did contract,
And cannot answer - O the sorry trade!
85
O Thou, who didst with pitfall and with gin
Beset the road I was to wander in,
Thou wilt not with predestination round
Enmesh me, and impute my fall to sin!
86
O Thou, who man of baser earth didst make,
And who with Eden didst devise the snake;
For all the sin wherewith the face of man
Is blacken'd, man's forgiveness give - and take!

KUZA-NAMA ("Book of Pots")

89
Then said another - 'Surely not in vain
My substance from the common earth was ta'en
That He who subtly wrought me into shape
Should stamp me back to common earth again.'
90
Another said - 'Why, ne'er a peevish boy
Would break the bowl from which he drank in joy;
Shall He that made the vessel in pure love
And fancy, in an after rage destroy!"
91
None answer'd this; but after silence spake
A vessel of a more ungainly make:
'They sneer at me for leaning all awry;
What! did the hand then of the Potter shake?'
92
Said one - 'Folks of a surly Tapster tell,
And daub his visage with the smoke of Hell;
They talk of some strict testing of us - Pish!
He's a good fellow, and 'twill all be well.'
97
Indeed the Idols I have loved so long
Have done my credit in men's eye much wrong:
Have drown'd my honor in a shallow cup
And sold my reputation for a song.
98
Indeed, indeed, Repentance oft before
I swore - but was I sober when I swore?
And then and then came Spring, and rose-in-hand
My threadbare Penitence apieces tore.
100
Alas, that Spring should vanish with the rose!
That youth's sweet-scented manuscript should close!
The nightingale that in the branches sang,
Ah, whence, and wither flown again, who knows!
103
Ah Love! Could Thou and I with fate conspire
To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire,
Would we not shatter it to bits - and then
Re-mould it nearer to the heart's desire!
104
Ah, Moon of my Delight who know'st no wane,
The Moon of Heav'n is rising once again:
How oft hereafter rising shall she look
Through this same garden after me - in vain!
105
And when thyself with shining foot shall pass
Among the guests star-scattered on the grass,
And in thy joyous errand reach the spot
Where I made one - turn down an empty glass!

TAMAM SHUD (It is completed)

Rumi

Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu, Buddhist, Sufi, or Zen. Not any religion or cultural system.

I am not from the East or the West, not out of the ocean or up from the ground, not natural or ethereal, not composed of elements at all.

I do not exist, am not an entity in this world or the next, did not descend from Adam and Eve or any origin story.

My place is placeless, a trace of the traceless. Neither body or soul.

I belong to the beloved, have seen the two worlds as one and that one call to and know, first, last, outer, inner, only that breath breathing human being.

There is a way between voice and presence where information flows.

In disciplined silence it opens. With wandering talk it closes.

((Only Breath))

There is a community of the spirit. Join it, and feel the delight of walking in the noisy street, and being the noise.

Drink all your passion and be a disgrace.

Close both eyes to see with the other eye.

Open your hands, if you want to be held.

Sit down in this circle.

Quit acting like a wolf, and feel the shepherd's love filling you.

At night, your beloved wanders. Don't accept consolations.

Close your mouth against food. Taste the lover's mouth in yours.

You moan, 'She left me.' 'He left me.' Twenty more will come.

Be empty of worrying. Think who created thought!

Why do you stay in prison when the door is so wide open?

Move outside the tangle of fear-thinking. Live in silence.

Flow down and down in ever-widening rings of being.

((A Community of the Spirit))

All day I think about it, then at night I say it. Where did I come from, and what am I supposed to be doing? I have no idea. My soul is from elsewhere, I'm sure of that, and I intend to end up there.

This drunkenness began in some other tavern. When I get back around to that place, I'll be completely sober.

… The day is coming when I fly off, but who is it now in my ear who hears my voice? Who says words with my mouth?

Who looks out with my eyes? What is the soul? I cannot stop asking. If I could taste one sip of an answer, I could break out of this prison for drunks. I didn't come here of my own accord, and I can't leave that way, whoever brought me here will have to take me home.

This poetry. I never know what I'm going to say. When I'm outside the saying of it, I get very quiet and rarely speak at all.

((Who Says Words With My Mouth?))

Listen to the story told by the reed, of being separated.

'Since I was cut from the reedbed, I have made this crying sound.

Anyone apart from someone he loves understands what I say.

Anyone pulled from a source longs to go back.

… but its not given us to see the soul. The reed flute is fire, not wind. Be that empty.'

The reed is hurt and save combining. Intimacy and longing for intimacy, one song. A disastrous surrender and a fine love, together. The one who secretly hears this is senseless.

… Days full of wanting, let them go by without worrying that they do. Stay where you are inside such a pure, hollow note.

… No one lives in that without being nourished every day.

But if someone doesn't want to hear the song of the reed flute, it's best to cut conversation short, say good-bye, and leave.

((The Reed Flute's Song))

… Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I'll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in the grass, the world is too full to talk about. Ideas, language, even the phrase each other doesn't make any sense.

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you. Don't go back to sleep. You must ask for what you really want. Don't go back to sleep.

… I would love to kiss you. The price of kissing is your life. Now my loving is running toward my life shouting, What a bargain, let's buy it.

… They try to say what you are, spiritual or sexual?
They wonder about Solomon and all his wives.

… But we have ways within each other that will never be said by anyone.

Come to the orchard I Spring. There is light and wine, and sweethearts in the pomegranate flowers.

If you do not come, these do not matter. If you do come, these do not matter.

((Quatrains))

This mirror inside me shows - I can't say what, but I can't not know!

I run from body, I run from spirit. I do not belong anywhere.

((The Shape of My Tongue))

The friend comes into my body looking for the center, unable to finding it, draws a blade, and strikes anywhere.

There is a light seed grain inside. You fill it with yourself or it dies.

I'm caught in this curling energy! Your hair! Whoever's calm and sensible is insane!

Do you think I know what I'm doing? That for one breath or half-breath I belong to myself? As much as a pen knows what it's writing, or the ball can guess where it's going next.

((Quatrains))

Don't run around this world looking for a hole to hide in. There are beasts in every cave!

The only real rest comes where you're alone with God.

… Sometimes you look at a person and see a cynical snake. Someone else sees a joyful lover, and you're both right!

… Joseph looked ugly to his brothers, and most handsome to his father.

((Tending Two Shops))

After all my lust and dead living I can still live with you. You want me to. You fix and bring me food. You forget the way I've been.

((Bonfire At Midnight))

When I am with you, we stay up all night. When you're not here, I can't go to sleep.

… The moment I heard my first love story, I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was.

Lovers don't finally meet somewhere. They're in each other all along.

We are the mirror as well as the face in it.

… You would rather throw stones at a mirror? I am your mirror, and here are the stones.

((Quatrains))

… Mysteries are not to be solved. The eye goes blind when it only wants to see why.

((Someone Digging in the Ground))

Who makes these changes? I shoot an arrow right. It lands left. I ride after a deer and find myself chased by a hog. I plot to get what I want and end up in prison. I dig pits to trap others and fall in.

I should be suspicious of what I want.

((Who Makes These Changes?))

Someone says, Sanai is dead. No small thing to say.
He was not bits of husk, or a puddle that freezes overnight, or a comb that cracks when you use it, or a pod crushed open on the ground.

He was fine powder in a rough clay dish. He knew what both worlds were worth: a grain of barley.

One he slung down, the other up.

The inner soul, that presence of which most know nothing, about which poets are so ambiguous, he married that one to the beloved.

His pure gold wine pours on the thick wine dregs. They mix and rise and separate again to meet down the road.

… Be quiet and clear now, like the final touchpoints of calligraphy.

Your name has been erased from the roaring volume of speech.

Sanai

… Blind delegates by blind electorate were therefore chosen to investigate the beast, and each, by feeling trunk or limb, strove to acquire an image clear of him. Thus each conceived a visionary whole, and to the phantom clung with heart and soul.

… Each one of them - wrong and misguided all - was eager his impressions to recall. Asked to describe the creature's size and shape …

Now, for his knowledge each inquiring wight, must trust to touch, being devoid of sight, so he who only felt the creature's ear, on being asked: 'How doth its heart appear?' 'Mighty and terrible,' at once replied, 'Like to a carpet, hard and flat, and wide!' Then he who on its trunk had laid his hand broke in: 'Nay, nay! I better understand! 'Tis like a water-pipe, I tell you true, hollow, yet deadly and destructive too'; While he who'd had but leisure to explore the sturdy limbs which the great beast upbore, exclaimed: 'No, no! To all men be it known, 'tis like a column tapered to a cone!'

Each had but known one part, and no man all; hence into deadly error each did fall. No way to know The All man's heart can find: can knowledge e'er accompany the blind?

(The Blind Men and The Elephant))

… He said: 'I was a hidden treasure; creation was created that you might know me.'

… The road your self must journey on lies in polishing the mirror of your heart.

… creatures comelier than angels even seem in a dagger to have devil's faces.

Your dagger will never tell you true from false: it will never serve you as a mirror. Better to seek your image in your heart, than in your mortal clay …

The way is not far from you to the friend: you yourself are that way: set out along it.

You who know nothing of the life that comes from the juice of the grape, how long will you remain intoxicated by the outward form of the grape? Why do you lie that you are drunk?

If you drink wine, keep quiet about it: a milk-drinker says nothing, so why should you?

… How can you go forward? There is no place to go. How can you leap? You have no foot. …

… Arrange things so that when death calls, he finds your soul waiting in the street. Leave this house of vagabonds: if you are at God's door, stay there; if not, make your way there now.

… As long as you cling to your self, you will wander right and left … but, if, once freed from yourself, you finally get down to work, this door will open to you within two minutes.

… The head has two ears; the heart has just one: this one hears certitude, whilst those hear doubt.

Until you throw your sword away, you'll not become a shield; until you lay your crown aside, you'll not be fit to lead.

… And when you have abandoned both individuality and understanding, this world will become that.

… pass life and body, faith and reason by, on the road to God acquire a soul.

… Whether you exist or not is indifferent to the working of God's power.

Everything is the work of God alone, - and happy is the man that knows it!

… Read the letters with your tongue, read their meaning with your soul.

As long as your desire is pleasure, and you cherish your desire, carry on playing like a child: you are not man enough for this.

You, who have brought nothing back but foam from the ocean, you, with your possessions arrayed around you, you have not grasped the essence of the pearl, being forever engrossed in the oyster shell. Leave these muddy shells alone; bring up the pure pearl from the ocean depths.

The arrow's worth lies in hitting the mark. If you are pure, the hidden sense will emerge from the framework of the written word; for until a man steps out from impurity, how can the Koran step out from the page? As long as you are veiled in self, how can you discriminate between good and evil? The letter of the Koran is in itself no panacea for the soul: Goats do not grow fat on the goatherd's call.

((The Walled Garden of Truth))

God knows what depths and shallows each soul can navigate, the draught of every creature.

… Your best life-food is a bare table. You have no desire capable of wishing for what God has already made for you.

... Don't cry your grief. God is already saying it. He hears the ant's foot touching the rock at night, and the stone shifting in the stream, and the worm's song of praise inside the ground.

… Follow what you live within, the given, or you'll come to the end swimming in an ocean of your own shame.
((Earthworm Guidance))

… Say the Name. Moisten your tongue with praise, and be the spring ground, waking.

… As you fill with wisdom, and your heart with love, there's no more thirst.

There's only an unselfed patience waiting on the doorsill, a silence which doesn't listen to advice from people passing in the street.

((The Wild Rose of Praise))

… Decades it takes a child
to change into a poet.

((The Time Needed))

If you want the pearl, leave the inland dessert, and wander by the sea.

Even if you don't find it, at least you've been near the water.

Be a warrior! Desire something powerfully! Saddle your horse and get ready for the quest.

… Be energetic in the work that takes you to God!

The weak and sickly only think about surrender.
Lie down before the door you long to go through.

posted August 27, 2004 01:57 AM         

by Bob Dylan

I married Isis on the fifth day of May,
But I could not hold on to her very long.
So I cut off my hair and I rode straight away
For the wild unknown country where I could not go wrong.

I came to a high place of darkness and light.
The dividing line ran through the center of town.
I hitched up my pony to a post on the right,
Went in to a laundry to wash my clothes down.

A man in the corner approached me for a match.
I knew right away he was not ordinary.
He said, "Are you lookin' for somethin' easy to catch?"
I said, "I got no money." He said, "That ain't necessary."

We set out that night for the cold in the North.
I gave him my blanket, he gave me his word.
I said, "Where are we goin'?" He said we'd be back by the fourth.
I said, "That's the best news that I've ever heard."

I was thinkin' about turquoise, I was thinkin' about gold,
I was thinkin' about diamonds and the world's biggest necklace.
As we rode through the canyons, through the devilish cold,
I was thinkin' about Isis, how she thought I was so reckless.

How she told me that one day we would meet up again,
And things would be different the next time we wed,
If I only could hang on and just be her friend.
I still can't remember all the best things she said.

We came to the pyramids all embedded in ice.
He said, "There's a body I'm tryin' to find.
If I carry it out it'll bring a good price."
'Twas then that I knew what he had on his mind.

The wind it was howlin' and the snow was outrageous.
We chopped through the night and we chopped through the dawn.
When he died I was hopin' that it wasn't contagious,
But I made up my mind that I had to go on.

I broke into the tomb, but the casket was empty.
There was no jewels, no nothin', I felt I'd been had.
When I saw that my partner was just bein' friendly,
When I took up his offer I must-a been mad.

I picked up his body and I dragged him inside,
Threw him down in the hole and I put back the cover.
I said a quick prayer and I felt satisfied.
Then I rode back to find Isis just to tell her I love her.

She was there in the meadow where the creek used to rise.
Blinded by sleep and in need of a bed,
I came in from the East with the sun in my eyes.
I cursed her one time then I rode on ahead.

She said, "Where ya been?" I said, "No place special."
She said, "You look different." I said, "Well, not quite."
She said, "You been gone." I said, "That's only natural."
She said, "You gonna stay?" I said, "Yeah, I jes might."

Isis, oh, Isis, you mystical child.
What drives me to you is what drives me insane.
I still can remember the way that you smiled
On the fifth day of May in the drizzlin' rain.

posted August 27, 2004 01:58 AM         

and william butler....what a lilting romp was that dreamy poem....takes us beyond the physical, he does....how beautiful that must have sounded read aloud. what a grand dinner party!

posted August 27, 2004 09:36 AM         

It lies around us like a cloud,
A world we do not see:
Yet the sweet closing of an eye
May bring us there to be.

Its gentle breezes fan our cheek;
Amid our worldly cares,
Its gentle voices whisper love,
And mingle with our prayers.

Sweet hearts around us throb and beat,
Sweet helping hands are stirred,
And palpitates the veil between
With breathing almost heard.

The silence, awful, sweet, and calm,
They have no power to break;
For mortal words are not for them
To utter or partake.

So thin, so soft, so sweet, they glide,
So near to press they seem,
They lull us gently to our rest,
They melt into our dream.

And in the hush of rest they bring
'T is easy now to see
how lovely and how sweet a pass
The hour of death may be;--

To close the eye, and close the ear,
Wrapped in a trance of bliss,
And, gently drawn in loving arms,
To swoon to that--from this,--

Scarce knowing if we wake or sleep,
Scarce asking where we are,
To feel all evil sink away,
All sorrow and all care.

Sweet souls around us! watch us still;
Press nearer to our side;
Into our thoughts, into our prayers,
With gentle helpings glide.

posted August 27, 2004 09:40 AM         

I loved the ones I've read. Bissie (Jazz), the one by Yavorov was wonderful...Gia, Neruda too was wonderful...talaith, Rilke was wonderful.

posted August 27, 2004 10:01 AM         

....and through the lattice which moved as
if a hand is touched by a
hand(which
moved as though
fingers touch a girl's
breast,
lightly)
Do you believe in always,the wind
said to the rain
I am too busy with
my flowers to believe,the rain answered

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

(ee cummings)

posted August 27, 2004 10:04 AM         

i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
wich is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth
day of life and love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

posted August 27, 2004 10:12 AM         

I adore this poem by Grace Cavalieri, it wouldn't really work just selecting a couple of lines, the whole poem flows together almost Gooberz style. It seems like she wrote it through my eyes as a child; {replacing mother with father though)

Grace Cavalieri (1937– )

Dates

The silver from my mother’s mirror
gleams its stories
toward a light which drops and never breaks.
It says to tell the truth and

permanently shining, brings forth
an original day bright as this one
where children and other small creatures
played without threat

but the child’s story is never without fear—is it—
and seems to be made of remainders which either
want for love or some relief from it.

In the third grade the pyramids were presented to us
by Miss O’Malley
so kind that she would—
in honor of learning—
give us the key to Egypt
if she could.
Who would like to bring dates for all to taste?
Who can do this on the lunch hour? she asked.

Naturally I
—who could not imagine how—
said I would—
and, like a child with enough money to spend, ran home with only one hour, one hour to ease my dear mother who probably had
little money in the house, yet who bravely asked
“Shouldn’t you buy two packages for the class”
I said No.

Love and fear divided in my mind between
an ocean of children
and my mother’s troubled face,
“One package is all I need” I lied,
“Someone else will bring the rest”
(Children spend so much time persuading—
no wonder no one believes them).

Eight dates for twenty children
which would taste so sweet—
Miss O’Malley, always kind, cut the tiny squares
and I kept interrupting, hoping they
wouldn’t notice. After all
there wasn’t water in the land of pyramids . . . was
there . . . and
not too many trees,
probably hungry people and small rations there as well.

That day every one of us was a reflection of the other—
the children who ate their portions,
the mother at home worrying about her daughter’s gift..
..the child thinking about her mother’s face,
and Miss O’Malley who, kind and earnest,
taught us all about a hardy people in an arid land
who gave what they had and could give nothing more.

posted August 27, 2004 10:51 AM         

quote:

---

How a Ship having passed the Line was driven by storms to the cold Country towards
the South Pole; and how from thence she made her course to the tropical Latitude of
the Great Pacific Ocean; and of the strange things that befell; and in what manner the
Ancyent Marinere came back to his own Country.

---

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)

from; The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

[after he killed the albatross]

The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,
The furrow followed free;
We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea.

[The ship hath been suddenly becalmed.]

Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down,
'Twas sad as sad could be;
And we did speak only to break
The silence of the sea!

All in a hot and copper sky,
The bloody Sun, at noon,
Right up above the mast did stand,
No bigger than the Moon.

Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.

[And the Albatross begins to be avenged.]

Water, water, everywhere,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, everywhere,
Nor any drop to drink.

The very deep did rot: O Christ!
That ever this should be!
Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs
Upon the slimy sea.

About, about, in reel and rout
The death-fires danced at night;
The water, like a witch's oils,
Burnt green, and blue and white.

[A Spirit had followed them; one of the invisible inhabitants of this planet, neither
departed souls nor angels; concerning whom the learned Jew, Josephus, and the
Platonic Constantinopolitan, Michael Psellus, may be consulted. They are very
numerous, and there is no climate or element without one or more.]

And some in dreams assurèd were
Of the Spirit that plagued us so;
Nine fathom deep he had followed us
From the land of mist and snow.

And every tongue, through utter drought,
Was withered at the root;
We could not speak, no more than if
We had been choked with soot.

[The shipmates, in their sore distress, would fain throw the whole guilt on the
ancient Mariner: in sign whereof they hang the dead sea-bird round his neck.]

Ah! well-a-day! what evil looks
Had I from old and young!
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung.

posted August 27, 2004 10:54 AM         

Longing

Again this tremble of the heart
For roads without end or start...
I'm going lonely on a trip.

And looking through the foggy morrow
I see just shadow of a sorrow -
The only harbour for my ship.

posted August 27, 2004 11:01 AM         

Here am I - breathing,
Working,
Living
And writing my poetry
(My best ti it giving).
Life and I glower
Across at each other,
And with it I struggle
With all my power.
Life and I quarrel,
But don't draw the moral
That I despise it.
No, just the opposite!
Though I should perist,
Life with its brutal
Claws of steel
Still would I cherish,
Still would I cherish!

Supose round my neck they tie fast
The rope
And they ask:
"Would you like one more hour to live?"
I would instantly cry:
"Untie!
Untie!
Come, quickly untie
The rope, you devils!"

For Life there is nothing
I would not dare.
I would fly
A prototype plane in the sky,
I'd climb in a roaring
Rocket, exploring
Alone
In space
Distant
Planets.

Still would I feel
A joyous thrill
Gazing
Up
At the blue sky.
Still would I feel
A joyous thrill
To be alive,
To go on living.

But look, suppose
You took - how much? -
A single grain
From this my faith,
Then would I rage,
I would rage from pain
Like a panter
Pierced to the heart.

For what of me
Would there remain?
After the theft
I'd be distraught.
To put it plainly
And more directly -
After the theft
I would be naught.

Maybe you wish
You could erase
My faith
In happy days,
My faith -
That tomorrow
Life will be finer,
Life will be wiser?

Pray, how will you smash it?
With bullets?
No! That is unless!
Stop! It's not worth it!

My faith has strong armour
In my sturdy breast,
And bullets able to shatter
My faith
Do not exist,
Do not exist!
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Delphi/4369/vera_eng.htm

posted August 27, 2004 01:36 PM         

Whisper me a legend
Whisper me a lie
Whisper me a flowering tree
And warm me in its fire

Speak to me of tapestry
Speak to me of gold
Sing me air and sing me fire
With your voice of wintery cold.

By Mary O'Malley

Gia

posted August 27, 2004 01:44 PM           

I have another that I place with it.
Read together, they go:

i thank You God for most this
amazing day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;
and for everything
which is natural which
is infinite
which is yes
(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday;
this is the birth
day of life and of love and wings:
and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)
how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?
(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

may my heart always be open to little
birds who are the secrets of living
what ever they sing is better than to know
and if men should not hear them
men are old
may my mind stroll about hungry
and fearless and thirsty and supple
and even if it's sunday may i be wrong
for whenever men are right
they are not young
and may my self do nothing usefully
and love yourself so more than truly
there's never been
quite such a fool who could fail
pulling all the sky over him with one smile

posted August 27, 2004 04:58 PM         

I emailed you last night and it got returned. Have you changed? I better check those numbers again.

Gia