I can't possibly choose one without reservation! But okay, Stanley Kunitz's The Layers has been one of my favourites for the longest time. And I love The Science of the Night too! ♥
Absolutely! When I get to a grand old age, I want to be able to look back on this poem and think, yep, this is me. ♥ The last line, it gets me every time
the one in russian about dog rose and grapes; i think i did a bad, bad translation somewhere. idk why it's favorite - it's not the best, and not even tsvetaeva - but i do love it the most.
Lol cliched, I think, but i carry your heart with me by ee cummings. I think it was the first poem that I ever truly loved, and it's never stopped being my favorite. I also have a soft spot for Edgar Allen Poe's Annabel Lee and Tennyson's The Lady of Shallot, because when I was a small child I used to walk around the house dramatically reciting them and scaring my mother.
OMG I WAS OBSESSED WITH ANNABEL LEE THREE YEARS AGO - I used to walk around reciting it from memory at bemused friends; i carry your heart with me is great also! I had not read The Lady of Shallot, thanks for linking. :D
Oh wow, these are all brilliant, and completely new to me. I haven't had the chance to read all of them properly yet, but I enjoy your taste in poetry, bb!
no way dude I WON'T SUBMIT TO YOUR TYRANNY have two:
My Hero Bares His Nerves
My hero bares his nerves along my wrist That rules from wrist to shoulder, Unpacks the head that, like a sleepy ghost, Leans on my mortal ruler, The proud spine spurning turn and twist.
And these poor nerves so wired to the skull Ache on the lovelorn paper I hug to love with my unruly scrawl That utters all love hunger And tells the page the empty ill.
My hero bares my side and sees his heart Tread; like a naked Venus, The beach of flesh, and wind her bloodred plait; Stripping my loin of promise, He promises a secret heat.
He holds the wire from this box of nerves Praising the mortal error Of birth and death, the two sad knaves of thieves, And the hunger's emperor; He pulls that chain, the cistern moves.
Here comes another alpha male, and all the other alphas are snorting and pawing, kicking up puffs of acrid dust
while the silly little hens clatter back and forth on quivering claws and raise a titter about the fuss.
Here comes another alpha male - a man's man, a dealmaker, holds tanks of liquor, charms them pantsless at lunch;
I've never been sicker. Do I have to stare into his eyes and sympathize? If I want my job I do. Well I think I'm through with the working world, through with warming eggs and being Zenlike in my detachment from all things ego.
I'd like to go somewhere else entirely, and I don't mean Europe.
Saying Yes to a Drink
What's a grown woman do? She'd tug off an earring when the phone rang, drop it to the desk
for the clatter and roll. You'd hear in this the ice, tangling in the glass; in her voice, low on the line, the drink
being poured. All night awake I heard its fruity murmur of disease and cure. I heard the sweet word "sleep,"
which made me thirstier. Did I say it, or did you? And will I learn to wave the drink with a good-bye wrist
in conversations, toss it off all bracelet-bare like more small talk about a small affair? To begin, I'll claim what I want
is small; the childish hand of a dream to smooth me over, a cold sip of water in bed,
your one kiss, never again. I'll claim I was a girl before this gin, then beg for another.
obvs I lied about only two. This is so much it hurts. For real.
A Valediction Forbidding Mourning
AS virtuous men pass mildly away, And whisper to their souls to go, Whilst some of their sad friends do say, "Now his breath goes," and some say, "No."
So let us melt, and make no noise, No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move ; 'Twere profanation of our joys To tell the laity our love.
Moving of th' earth brings harms and fears ; Men reckon what it did, and meant ; But trepidation of the spheres, Though greater far, is innocent.
Dull sublunary lovers' love —Whose soul is sense—cannot admit Of absence, 'cause it doth remove The thing which elemented it.
But we by a love so much refined, That ourselves know not what it is, Inter-assurèd of the mind, Care less, eyes, lips and hands to miss.
Our two souls therefore, which are one, Though I must go, endure not yet A breach, but an expansion, Like gold to aery thinness beat.
If they be two, they are two so As stiff twin compasses are two ; Thy soul, the fix'd foot, makes no show To move, but doth, if th' other do.
And though it in the centre sit, Yet, when the other far doth roam, It leans, and hearkens after it, And grows erect, as that comes home.
Such wilt thou be to me, who must, Like th' other foot, obliquely run ; Thy firmness makes my circle just, And makes me end where I begun.
jkasf;lkajf;ldjf;ldsjf I should read more Dylan Thomas. I feel like the only ones I've read of his are... stuff you've posted. But it's so good!
I also really like the Deborah Garrison ones, thanks, bb! But here I will say: I DON'T GET THE POINT OF JOHN DONNE. I would... really, really like to /o\ I studied him at A level and everything (not that that means anything, uh) but... isn't he just a casual dickbag with strange ugly metaphors??? SOMEBODY ENLIGHTEN ME.
Dylan Thomas and Deborah Garrison both speak to my heart!!! As does John Donne, actually, "The Flea" aside. Thomas can be hard for me to read much of in one sitting, because the poems are so amazing to me, so idk if you want to jump right on the Collected Poems, but if you don't mind a piecemeal introduction, may I suggest In my Craft or Sullen Art, And Death Shall Have No Dominion, and A Process in the Weather of the Heart? And if you want more Garrison, those are from the book A Working Girl Can't Win, which she wrote when she was in her early twenties trying to Make It in New York.
Sorry I can't help with the Donne! idk what you mean by the "point" of him. If you don't like him, you don't, and that's fine! I mean, I guess I can ~artistically appreciate~ the metaphor in "The Flea," but I still don't want to read it. And idk what you mean by "casual dickbag." He may well have been! I don't think so (my impression was he gave up his Catholicism - which was very important to him and his poetry - to become a Protestant minister so as to feed his sick wife - with whom he fell in love when they were young and whose father didn't approve so had him sent to jail and then sea, which I think shows faithfulness on Donne's part if nothing else), but I could very much be wrong. Most of what I know of his personal history I got from an all-nighter for a paper back in twelfth grade, so. Please take it with a large grain of salt. (And hoo boy it's not like Thomas wasn't a "casual dickbag" if by that you mean "a drunk who cheated on his wife." I still love and am moved by his poetry.)
But! If you are asking on a more personal level about the point of his poetry to me, I'll just say that "A Valediction Forbidding Mourning" gets me in the bone because it describes a lot of what I feel, and I love the metaphor; that "The Sun Rising" is one of my favorite aubades ("she is all states, and all princes I"); and that I really like his religious writings, Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions. That's possibly even more of a personal choice than the poetry, and I certainly wouldn't want to seem (or worse, be) proselytizing, but this passage is to me very beautiful (from Meditation XVII, more famous for "no man is an island"):
all mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated; God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice; but God's hand is in every translation, and his hand shall bind up all our scattered leaves again for that library where every book shall lie open to one another.
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extemporally) wrote2011-06-10 10:11 am
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one from Samuel Beckett
one from Anais Nin
one from Emily Dickinson
one from ee cummings
one from Carol Frost
one from Lisel Mueller
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Things Eve Learned from the Serpent
The Sciences Sing a Lullaby
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Things Eve Learned from the Serpent
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may not kill you, but it also
may not be worth
living for; that this world is bigger
than one garden, humanity
than one man,
ohhhh shit. I feel like I'd been linked this before, but never read it properly. Thanks ♥
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... :(
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Aye, maybe I did resent
Your home in every element.
But did you know, when you were one
With the dance or dive or ride or run
And lost to water, earth and air
How lost you were to me? Or care?
Let me tell you how it was.
We'd stopped four miles outside Montrose
To let the southbound train slip by.
It was evening, and the sea and sky
Were one blue flag, with no design
But for the darker bluer line
Where the upper rested on the lower,
And one small cloud ten miles offshore.
The cloud had drawn up to a halt
To leave the sea a gram less salt.
It poured down on no rock or ship
But just upon its own dark shape
Combing out its rain like wool,
Like a girl her hair above a pool;
Or else (all I could do was sit
Before the scene and worry it)
The sea reached up invisibly
To milk the ache out of the sky.
While I was reckoning the strange
Intimate far-off exchange
The feeling took an age to name.
It was an awful creeping shame.
Nothing on earth was ever less
Concern of mine than that caress,
If such a human word would do
For what I saw; and worse, I knew
The whole sea fixed me in its stare.
How did I blunder into here?
There would be all hell to pay.
I turned and shut my eyes and lay
My head against the growling glass
And waited for the train to pass.
Don Paterson
(I couldn't find this online anywhere, it's from his recent collection Rain. AMAZING BOOK. BUY IT.)
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My head against the growling glass
And waited for the train to pass.
Always, always. ♥
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My Hero Bares His Nerves
My hero bares his nerves along my wrist
That rules from wrist to shoulder,
Unpacks the head that, like a sleepy ghost,
Leans on my mortal ruler,
The proud spine spurning turn and twist.
And these poor nerves so wired to the skull
Ache on the lovelorn paper
I hug to love with my unruly scrawl
That utters all love hunger
And tells the page the empty ill.
My hero bares my side and sees his heart
Tread; like a naked Venus,
The beach of flesh, and wind her bloodred plait;
Stripping my loin of promise,
He promises a secret heat.
He holds the wire from this box of nerves
Praising the mortal error
Of birth and death, the two sad knaves of thieves,
And the hunger's emperor;
He pulls that chain, the cistern moves.
- Dylan Thomas
two by deborah garrison
Here comes another alpha male,
and all the other alphas
are snorting and pawing,
kicking up puffs of acrid dust
while the silly little hens
clatter back and forth
on quivering claws and raise
a titter about the fuss.
Here comes another alpha male -
a man's man, a dealmaker,
holds tanks of liquor,
charms them pantsless at lunch;
I've never been sicker.
Do I have to stare into his eyes
and sympathize? If I want my job
I do. Well I think I'm through
with the working world,
through with warming eggs
and being Zenlike in my detachment
from all things ego.
I'd like to go
somewhere else entirely,
and I don't mean
Europe.
Saying Yes to a Drink
What's a grown woman do?
She'd tug off an earring
when the phone rang, drop it to the desk
for the clatter and roll. You'd hear
in this the ice, tangling in the glass;
in her voice, low on the line, the drink
being poured. All night awake
I heard its fruity murmur of disease
and cure. I heard the sweet word "sleep,"
which made me thirstier. Did I say it,
or did you? And will I learn
to wave the drink with a good-bye wrist
in conversations, toss it off all bracelet-bare
like more small talk about a small affair?
To begin, I'll claim what I want
is small; the childish hand
of a dream to smooth me over,
a cold sip of water in bed,
your one kiss, never again.
I'll claim I was a girl before this gin,
then beg for another.
finally
A Valediction Forbidding Mourning
AS virtuous men pass mildly away,
And whisper to their souls to go,
Whilst some of their sad friends do say,
"Now his breath goes," and some say, "No."
So let us melt, and make no noise,
No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move ;
'Twere profanation of our joys
To tell the laity our love.
Moving of th' earth brings harms and fears ;
Men reckon what it did, and meant ;
But trepidation of the spheres,
Though greater far, is innocent.
Dull sublunary lovers' love
—Whose soul is sense—cannot admit
Of absence, 'cause it doth remove
The thing which elemented it.
But we by a love so much refined,
That ourselves know not what it is,
Inter-assurèd of the mind,
Care less, eyes, lips and hands to miss.
Our two souls therefore, which are one,
Though I must go, endure not yet
A breach, but an expansion,
Like gold to aery thinness beat.
If they be two, they are two so
As stiff twin compasses are two ;
Thy soul, the fix'd foot, makes no show
To move, but doth, if th' other do.
And though it in the centre sit,
Yet, when the other far doth roam,
It leans, and hearkens after it,
And grows erect, as that comes home.
Such wilt thou be to me, who must,
Like th' other foot, obliquely run ;
Thy firmness makes my circle just,
And makes me end where I begun.
- John Donne
Re: finally
I also really like the Deborah Garrison ones, thanks, bb! But here I will say: I DON'T GET THE POINT OF JOHN DONNE. I would... really, really like to /o\ I studied him at A level and everything (not that that means anything, uh) but... isn't he just a casual dickbag with strange ugly metaphors??? SOMEBODY ENLIGHTEN ME.
Re: finally
Sorry I can't help with the Donne! idk what you mean by the "point" of him. If you don't like him, you don't, and that's fine! I mean, I guess I can ~artistically appreciate~ the metaphor in "The Flea," but I still don't want to read it. And idk what you mean by "casual dickbag." He may well have been! I don't think so (my impression was he gave up his Catholicism - which was very important to him and his poetry - to become a Protestant minister so as to feed his sick wife - with whom he fell in love when they were young and whose father didn't approve so had him sent to jail and then sea, which I think shows faithfulness on Donne's part if nothing else), but I could very much be wrong. Most of what I know of his personal history I got from an all-nighter for a paper back in twelfth grade, so. Please take it with a large grain of salt. (And hoo boy it's not like Thomas wasn't a "casual dickbag" if by that you mean "a drunk who cheated on his wife." I still love and am moved by his poetry.)
But! If you are asking on a more personal level about the point of his poetry to me, I'll just say that "A Valediction Forbidding Mourning" gets me in the bone because it describes a lot of what I feel, and I love the metaphor; that "The Sun Rising" is one of my favorite aubades ("she is all states, and all princes I"); and that I really like his religious writings, Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions. That's possibly even more of a personal choice than the poetry, and I certainly wouldn't want to seem (or worse, be) proselytizing, but this passage is to me very beautiful (from Meditation XVII, more famous for "no man is an island"):
all mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated; God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice; but God's hand is in every translation, and his hand shall bind up all our scattered leaves again for that library where every book shall lie open to one another.