by Ai
We smile at each other
and I lean back against the wicker couch.
How does it feel to be dead? I say.
You touch my knees with your blue fingers.
And when you open your mouth,
a ball of yellow light falls to the floor
and burns a hole through it.
Don’t tell me, I say. I don’t want to hear.
Did you ever, you start,
wear a certain kind of dress
and just by accident,
so inconsequential you barely notice it,
your fingers graze that dress
and you hear the sound of a knife cutting paper,
you see it too
and you realize how that image
is simply the extension of another image,
that your own life
is a chain of words
that one day will snap.
Words, you say, young girls in a circle, holding hands,
and beginning to rise heavenward
in their confirmation dresses,
like white helium balloons,
the wreathes of flowers on their heads spinning,
and above all that,
that’s where I’m floating,
and that’s what it’s like
only ten times clearer,
ten times more horrible.
Could anyone alive survive it?
A few random poems:
- Robert Burns: Epigram On Francis Grose The Antiquary:
- Darkness And Light by John Oxenham
- Алексей Жемчужников – Умные политики
- Aunt Helen by T. S. Eliot
- Duino Elegies: The Fourth Elegy by Rainer Maria Rilke
- I Hardly Remember by Rafael Guillen
- The Fall by William Barnes
- motionless_body.html
- Absence by Walter Savage Landor
- Юргис Балтрушайтис – Ночью
- Testimony by Seamus Heaney
- Gentlmen-Rankers by Rudyard Kipling
- Sonnet CXXXVII by William Shakespeare
- Esteem for Chloris by Robert Burns
- Николай Языков – Поздравление М. Н. Дириной
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
- Robert Burns: The Winter It Is Past:
- Robert Burns: To Daunton Me:
- Robert Burns: Talk Of Him That’s Far Awa:
- Robert Burns: The Lad They Ca’Jumpin John:
- Robert Burns: Duncan Davison :
- Robert Burns: Hey, The Dusty Miller:
- Robert Burns: How Long And Dreary Is The Night :
- Robert Burns: Up In The Morning Early:
- Robert Burns: Raving Winds Around Her Blowing: I composed these verses on Miss Isabella M’Leod of Raza, alluding to her feelings on the death of her sister, and the still more melancholy death of her sister’s husband, the late Earl of Loudoun, who shot himself out of sheer heart-break at some mortifications he suffered, owing to the deranged state of his finances.-R.B., 1971.
- Robert Burns: My Hoggie:
- Robert Burns: Stay My Charmer:
- Robert Burns: M’Pherson’s Farewell:
- Robert Burns: To The Weavers Gin Ye Go:
- Robert Burns: I’m O’er Young To Marry Yet:
- Robert Burns: Clarinda, Mistress Of My Soul:
- Robert Burns: Go On, Sweet Bird, And Sooth My Care:
- Robert Burns: Love In The Guise Of Friendship:
- Robert Burns: Sylvander To Clarinda: Extempore Reply to Verses addressed to the Author by a Lady, under the signature of “Clarinda” and entitled, On Burns saying he ‘had nothing else to do.’
- Robert Burns: On The Death Of Robert Dundas, Esq., Of Arniston,: Late Lord President of the Court of Session.
- Robert Burns: Birthday Ode For 31st December, 1787:
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
