by Agha Shahid Ali
First, grant me my sense of history:
I did it for posterity,
for kindergarten teachers
and a clear moral:
Little girls shouldn’t wander off
in search of strange flowers,
and they mustn’t speak to strangers.
And then grant me my generous sense of plot:
Couldn’t I have gobbled her up
right there in the jungle?
Why did I ask her where her grandma lived?
As if I, a forest-dweller,
didn’t know of the cottage
under the three oak trees
and the old woman lived there
all alone?
As if I couldn’t have swallowed her years before?
And you may call me the Big Bad Wolf,
now my only reputation.
But I was no child-molester
though you’ll agree she was pretty.
And the huntsman:
Was I sleeping while he snipped
my thick black fur
and filled me with garbage and stones?
I ran with that weight and fell down,
simply so children could laugh
at the noise of the stones
cutting through my belly,
at the garbage spilling out
with a perfect sense of timing,
just when the tale
should have come to an end.
A Walk Through the Yellow Pages
Copyright ©:
1987, SUN-Gemini Press
A few random poems:
- At The Close Of The Canvass poem – Ambrose Bierce poems | Poems and Poetry
- English Poetry. Madison Julius Cawein. Hymn to Spiritual Desire. Мэдисон Джулиус Кавейн.
- Владимир Высоцкий – Я был слесарь шестого разряда
- Imitation Of Spenser poem – John Keats poems
- Олег Бундур – Наши неприятности
- Silence
- Robert Burns: Jamie, Come Try Me:
- betrayal.html
- Why?
- On The Civil War On The East Coast Of The United States Of North America 1860 64
- My Beach by Robert Saltzman
- Федор Тютчев – Как летней иногда порою
- Владимир Маяковский – Ров (РОСТА №181)
- The Woodlands by William Barnes
- Jock O The Side poem – Andrew Lang poems
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
- Владимир Высоцкий – Песенка про мангустов
- Владимир Высоцкий – Песенка о слухах
- Владимир Высоцкий – Песенка ни про что, или Что случилось в Африке
- Владимир Высоцкий – Переворот в мозгах из края в край
- Владимир Высоцкий – Перед выездом в загранку заполняешь кучу бланков
- Владимир Высоцкий – Пародия на плохой детектив
- Владимир Высоцкий – Парня спасём, парня в детдом
- Владимир Высоцкий – Памятник
- Владимир Высоцкий – Палач
- Владимир Высоцкий – Охота на кабанов
- Владимир Высоцкий – Ох, где был я вчера
- Владимир Высоцкий – Отпустите мне грехи
- Владимир Высоцкий – От скучных шабашей смертельно уставши
- Владимир Высоцкий – Оплавляются свечи на старинный паркет
- Владимир Высоцкий – Она была в Париже
- Владимир Высоцкий – Он не вернулся из боя
- Владимир Высоцкий – Оловянные солдатики
- Владимир Высоцкий – Однако, втягивать живот
- Владимир Высоцкий – Один смотрел, другой орал
- Владимир Высоцкий – Очи чёрные: Часть I
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