The British
by A. S. J. Tessimond
We are a people living in shells and moving
Crablike; reticent, awkward, deeply suspicious;
Watching the world from a corner of half-closed eyelids,
Afraid lest someone show that he hates or loves us,
Afraid lest someone weep in the railway train.
We are coiled and clenched like a foetus clad in armour.
We hold our hearts for fear they fly like eagles.
We grasp our tongues for fear they cry like trumpets.
We listen to our own footsteps. We look both ways
Before we cross the silent empty road.
We are a people easily made uneasy,
Especially wary of praise, of passion, of scarlet
Cloaks, of gesturing hands, of the smiling stranger
In the alien hat who talks to all or the other
In the unfamiliar coat who talks to none.
We are afraid of too-cold thought or too-hot
Blood, of the opening of long-shut shafts or cupboards,
Of light in caves, of X-rays, probes, unclothing
Of emotion, intolerable revelation
Of lust in the light, of love in the palm of the hand.
We are afraid of, one day on a sunny morning,
Meeting ourselves or another without the usual
Outer sheath, the comfortable conversation,
And saying all, all, all we did not mean to,
All, all, all we did not know we meant.
A few random poems:
- From the Mountain by Wang Wei
- Silent consolation by Tanisha Avarsekar
- A beach dawn by Sunil Sharma
- To Any Dead Officer by Siegfried Sassoon
- On Passing The New Menin Gate by Siegfried Sassoon
- Photograph of My Father in His Twenty-Second Year by Raymond Carver
- The Birch-Tree at Loschwitz poem – Amy Levy poems | Poems and Poetry
- Song—Awa’, Whigs, Awa’ by Robert Burns
- Иван Крылов – Лиса-строитель (Басня)
- The house where I was born (03) by Yves Bonnefoy
- Gravity Suspended
- Death by Thomas Hood
- as_with_recitation_and_the_loss_of_a_kuhi.html
- Cult of Lynching by Satish Verma
- The Garden By The Bridge
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
- Shattered Head
- Rural Reflections
- Prospective Immigrants Please Note
- Power
- Planetarium
- Paula Becker To Clara Westhoff
- Our Whole Life
- Orion
- On Edges
- November 1968
- My Mouth Hovers Across Your Breasts
- Moving In Winter
- Miracle Ice Cream
- Living In Sin
- Integrity
- In Those Years
- In The Evening
- In A Classroom
- Implosions
- I Dream I M The Death Of Orpheus
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