A poem by Adrienne Cecile Rich (1929 – 2012)
If I’ve reached for your lines (I have)
like letters from the dead that stir the nerves
dowsed you for a springhead
to water my thirst
dug into my compost skeletons and petals
you surely meant to catch the light:
-at work in my wormeaten wormwood-raftered
stateless underground
have I a plea?
If I’ve touched your finger
with a ravenous tongue
licked from your palm a rift of salt
if I’ve dreamt or thought you
a pack of blood fresh-drawn
hanging darkred from a hook
higher than my heart
(you who understand transfusion)
where else should I appeal?
A pilot light lies low
while the gas jets sleep
(a cat getting toed from stove
into nocturnal ice)
language uncommon and agile as truth
melts down the most intractable silence
A lighthouse keeper’s ethics:
you tend for all or none
for this you might set your furniture on fire
A this we have blundered over
as if the lamp could be shut off at will
rescue denied for some
and still a lighthouse be
A few random poems:
- Colors by Shel Silverstein
- The Sick Man and the Nightingale poem – Amy Levy poems | Poems and Poetry
- Prayer of St. Francis Xavier poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Владимир Луговской – Капитанский штиль
- The Two Terrors poem – Amy Levy poems | Poems and Poetry
- VERY DISTURBING by Satish Verma
- Константин Бальмонт – Надгробные цветы
- Inscriptions Written with a Slate Pencil upon a Stone by William Wordsworth
- On The Menu by Graham Rowlands
- Владимир Бенедиктов – Я знаю, люблю я бесплодно
- Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? by William Shakespeare
- Leaving Early by Sylvia Plath
- Владимир Британишский – Историк и источник
- On A Miser (From The Greek) by William Cowper
- Corn Grinders by Sarojini Naidu
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
- Roar Shack poem – Alice Fulton
- Physically Hearted
- On The Conduct Of The World Seeking Beauty Against Government poem – Allen Ginsberg
- Not my poem
- My Sad Self poem – Allen Ginsberg
- Mugging (I) poem – Allen Ginsberg
- Millions of Us poem – Alice Notley
- Meaning of silence-ness.
- Making The Lion For All It’s Got — A Ballad poem – Allen Ginsberg
- Kraj Majales (King Of May) poem – Allen Ginsberg
- Kraj Majales (King Of May) poem – Allen Ginsberg
- It Would poem – Alice Notley
- Industrial Lace poem – Alice Fulton
- I the People poem – Alice Notley
- Human Tendency
- Gift poem – Alice Notley
- Feast of the Eyes
- City of My Childhood
- Cezanne’s Ports poem – Allen Ginsberg
- Borow
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.