tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35918550682305932922024-03-14T02:37:24.917-07:00Friko's Poetry and PicturesFrikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comBlogger230125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-25906696026910585612013-09-20T10:11:00.000-07:002013-09-20T10:11:26.930-07:00DAWN REVISITED<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7bGuJVX8Zqg/Ujc88-8JboI/AAAAAAAAFME/xT3Okq-Fpxs/s1600/220px-Ritadove008.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7bGuJVX8Zqg/Ujc88-8JboI/AAAAAAAAFME/xT3Okq-Fpxs/s400/220px-Ritadove008.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>
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Imagine you wake up</div>
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with a second chance; the blue jay</div>
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hawks his pretty wares</div>
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and the oak still stands, spreading</div>
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glorious shade. If you don’t look back,</div>
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the future never happens.</div>
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How good to rise in sunlight,</div>
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in the prodigal smell of biscuits -</div>
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eggs and sausage on the grill.</div>
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The whole sky is yours</div>
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to write on, blown open</div>
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to a blank page. Come on,</div>
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shake a leg! You’ll never know</div>
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who’s down there, frying those eggs,</div>
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if you don’t get up and see.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<i>Rita Dove</i></div>
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<i>1952</i></div>
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<i>Rita Frances Dove is an American poet and author. From 1993-1995 she served as Poet Laureate Consultant in poetry to the Library of Congress.</i></div>
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Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-9011260110918484572013-09-16T09:54:00.000-07:002013-09-16T09:54:26.535-07:00HARLEM (2)<div style="text-align: center;">
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_KoQP09arTg/Ujc2ombOq7I/AAAAAAAAFLs/MZNSwNirOGo/s1600/Langston-Hughes1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_KoQP09arTg/Ujc2ombOq7I/AAAAAAAAFLs/MZNSwNirOGo/s400/Langston-Hughes1.jpg" width="261" /></a></div>
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What happens to a dream deferred?</div>
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Does it dry up</div>
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like a raisin in the sun?</div>
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Or fester like a sore -</div>
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And then run?</div>
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Does it stink like rotten meat?</div>
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Or crust and sugar over like a syrupy sweet?</div>
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Maybe it just sags</div>
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like a heavy load.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<i>Or does it explode?</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
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<i>Langston Hughes</i></div>
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<i>1902-1967</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
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<i>James Mercer Langston Hughes was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist. He was one of the earliest innovators of the then-new literary art form jazz poetry. Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance.</i></div>
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Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-38175555019247626182013-09-04T10:51:00.000-07:002013-09-04T10:51:44.633-07:00VIGIL<br />
<br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Eu7KIAXPOC4/UidyOs2Q8wI/AAAAAAAAFKM/mOM-hU_6PRY/s1600/Unknown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Eu7KIAXPOC4/UidyOs2Q8wI/AAAAAAAAFKM/mOM-hU_6PRY/s400/Unknown.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<br />
Life is too short to sleep through.<br />
Stay up late, wait until the sea of traffic ebbs,<br />
until noise has drained from the world<br />
like blood from the cheeks of the full moon.<br />
Everyone else around you has succumbed:<br />
they lie like tranquillised pets on a vet's table;<br />
they languish on hospital trolleys and friends' couches,<br />
on iron beds in hostels for the homeless,<br />
under feather duvets at tourist B&Bs.<br />
The radio, devoid of listeners to confide in,<br />
turns repetitious. You are your own voice-over.<br />
You are alone in the bone-weary tower<br />
of your bleary-eyed, blinking lighthouse,<br />
watching the spillage of tide on the shingle inlet.<br />
You are the single-minded one who hears<br />
time shaking from the clock's fingertips<br />
like drops, who watches its hands<br />
chop years into diced seconds,<br />
who knows that when the church bell<br />
tolls at 2 or 3 it tolls unmistakably for you.<br />
You are the sole hand on deck when<br />
temperatures plummet and the hull<br />
of an iceberg is jostling for prominence.<br />
Your confidential number is the life-line<br />
where the sedated long-distance voices<br />
of despair hold out muzzily for an answer.<br />
You are the emergency services' driver<br />
ready to dive into action at the first<br />
warning signs of birth or death.<br />
You spot the crack in night's façade<br />
even before the red-eyed businessman<br />
on look-out from his transatlantic seat.<br />
You are the only reliable witness to when<br />
the light is separated from the darkness,<br />
who has learned to see the dark in its true<br />
colours, who has not squandered your life.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Dennis O’Driscoll<br />
1954-2012<br />
<br />
Dennis O'Driscoll was an Irish poet, essayist, critic and editor. He was regarded by many as one of the best European poets of his time.<br />
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Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-82572299971919922392013-08-30T09:47:00.000-07:002013-08-30T09:48:25.751-07:00QUILTS <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-i2k7ncqyDug/UiDKQbFwW6I/AAAAAAAAFI8/R2_7JZlljHw/s1600/Unknown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="260" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-i2k7ncqyDug/UiDKQbFwW6I/AAAAAAAAFI8/R2_7JZlljHw/s400/Unknown.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
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Like a fading piece of cloth</div>
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I am a failure.</div>
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No longer do I cover tables filled with food and laughter</div>
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My seams are frayed my hems falling my strength no longer able</div>
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To hold the hot and cold</div>
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I wish for those first days</div>
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When just woven I could keep water</div>
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From seeping through</div>
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Repelled stains with the tightness of my weave</div>
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Dazzled the sunlight with my </div>
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Reflection</div>
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I grow old though pleased with my memories</div>
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The tasks I can no longer complete</div>
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Are balanced by the love of the tasks gone past</div>
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I offer no apology only </div>
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this plea:</div>
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<br /></div>
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When I am frayed and strained and drizzle at the end</div>
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Please someone cut a square and put me in a quilt</div>
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That I might keep some child warm</div>
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And some old person with no one else to talk to</div>
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Will hear my whispers</div>
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And cuddle</div>
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near</div>
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<i>Nikki Giovanni</i></div>
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<i>1943-</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
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<i>Yolande Cornelia "Nikki" Giovanni Jr. is an American writer, commentator, activist, and educator. She is currently a distinguished professor of English at Virginia Tech.</i></div>
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Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-87874427018086847882013-08-23T14:32:00.000-07:002013-08-23T14:32:31.715-07:00END OF THE WORLD<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-81OV6kPt7wk/UgpiL3p6ccI/AAAAAAAAFIM/kzsbMcRFo8I/s1600/Unknown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-81OV6kPt7wk/UgpiL3p6ccI/AAAAAAAAFIM/kzsbMcRFo8I/s400/Unknown.jpeg" width="330" /></a></div>
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The day the world ends</div>
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will be clean and orderly</div>
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like the notebook</div>
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of the best student in the class.</div>
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The town drunk</div>
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will sleep in a ditch,</div>
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the express train will pass</div>
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without stopping at the station</div>
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and the regimental band </div>
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will endlessly practice</div>
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the march they have played in the square for twenty years.</div>
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Only some children</div>
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will leave their kites tangled</div>
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in telephone lines</div>
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to run home crying</div>
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not knowing what to tell their mothers</div>
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and I will carve my initials</div>
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in the bark of a linden tree</div>
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knowing that it won’t do any good.</div>
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The kids will play football</div>
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in the empty lot on the edge of town.</div>
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The holy sects will come out </div>
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to sing on the street corners.</div>
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The crazy old woman will pass with her parasol.</div>
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And I will say to myself: “The world cannot end,</div>
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because here on the patio the pigeons and the sparrows</div>
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are still squabbling over the grains."</div>
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<br /></div>
<i>Jorge Teillier</i><br />
<i>1935-1996</i><br />
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translated from the Spanish by <i>Miller Williams</i><br />
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<i><br /></i>Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-45029579460583402212013-08-16T16:13:00.000-07:002013-08-16T16:13:06.627-07:00WITH A GREEN SCARF<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-FjrL8AqmP5M/UgpetJ2sFSI/AAAAAAAAFH8/jdiRZoPy25c/s1600/1277475194Marin+Sorescu.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-FjrL8AqmP5M/UgpetJ2sFSI/AAAAAAAAFH8/jdiRZoPy25c/s400/1277475194Marin+Sorescu.jpg" width="301" /></a></div>
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With a green scarf I blindfolded </div>
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the eyes of the trees</div>
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and asked them to catch me.</div>
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At once the trees caught me,</div>
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their leaves shaking with laughter.</div>
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I blindfolded the birds</div>
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with a scarf of clouds</div>
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and asked them to catch me.</div>
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<br /></div>
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The birds caught me</div>
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with a song.</div>
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Then with a smile I blindfolded</div>
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my sorrow</div>
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and the day after it caught me</div>
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with a love.</div>
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I blindfolded the sun</div>
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with my nights</div>
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and asked the sun to catch me.</div>
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I know where you are, the sun said,</div>
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just behind that time.</div>
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Don’t bother to hide any longer.</div>
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Don’t bother to hide any longer,</div>
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said all of them,</div>
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as well as all the feelings</div>
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I tried to blindfold.</div>
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<br />
<i>Marin Sorescu</i><br />
<i>1936-1997</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
Translated from the Romanian by <i>Michael Hamburger</i><br />
<i><br /></i>Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-91619240167175447412013-08-13T08:58:00.000-07:002013-08-13T08:58:14.243-07:00AND WE LOVE LIFE<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Qe1JotJ-mcA/UgpUOIK7RAI/AAAAAAAAFHs/f3Rv2_JfqTY/s1600/mahmoud-darwish.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="261" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Qe1JotJ-mcA/UgpUOIK7RAI/AAAAAAAAFHs/f3Rv2_JfqTY/s400/mahmoud-darwish.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<br />
<br />
And we love life if we find a way to it.<br />
We dance in between martyrs and raise a minaret for violet or palm trees.<br />
<br />
We love life if we find a way to it.<br />
<br />
And we steal from the silkworm a thread to build a sky and fence in this departure.<br />
We open the garden gate for the jasmine to go out as a beautiful day on the streets.<br />
<br />
We love life if we find a way to it.<br />
<br />
And we plant, where we settle, some fast growing plants, and harvest the dead.<br />
We play the flute like the colour of the faraway, sketch over the dirt corridor a neigh.<br />
We write our names one stone at a time, O lightning make the night a bit clearer.<br />
<br />
We love life if we find a way to it. . . . .<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/mahmoud-darwish#poet">Mahmoud Darwish</a><br />
<i>1942-2008</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
translated from the Arabic by <i>Fady Joudah</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
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<br />Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-57080471159417363352013-08-02T11:33:00.000-07:002013-08-02T11:33:18.763-07:00THE ANGEL HANDED ME A BOOK<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kPK-649JZ-c/UfjsKDnIN_I/AAAAAAAAFFE/lPWINy5FxDU/s1600/Paul-Valery.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kPK-649JZ-c/UfjsKDnIN_I/AAAAAAAAFFE/lPWINy5FxDU/s400/Paul-Valery.jpg" width="322" /></a></div>
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<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
Placing a book in my hands, the angel said, “It holds all you would wish to know.” And he vanished.<br />
So I opened the book, which wasn’t thick.<br />
It was written in an unknown alphabet.<br />
Scholars translated it, but produced very different versions.<br />
They disagreed even about their own readings, agreeing neither upon the tops or bottoms of them, nor the beginnings, nor the ends.<br />
Toward the close of this vision, it seemed to me that the book<br />
melted, until it could no longer be told apart from the world that surrounds us.<br />
<br />
<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
<i>Paul Valéry</i><br />
<i>1871-1945</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
translated from the French by<i> Carolyn Forché </i><br />
<br />
<br />
Ambroise-Paul-Toussaint-Jules Valéry was a French poet, essayist, and philosopher. His interests were sufficiently broad that he can be classified as a polymath.<br />
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<br />Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-35947579017285601542013-07-31T03:43:00.000-07:002013-08-02T03:45:43.630-07:00From MORAL PROVERBS AND FOLKSONGS<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-t4ScPi-eLeU/UfjpEuofI-I/AAAAAAAAFE0/1Qq_w0CPcMs/s1600/antonio-machado-60-x-73.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-t4ScPi-eLeU/UfjpEuofI-I/AAAAAAAAFE0/1Qq_w0CPcMs/s400/antonio-machado-60-x-73.jpg" width="326" /></a></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
The best of the good people</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
know that in this life</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
it’s all a question of proportion;</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
a little more, a little less . . .</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Don’t be surprised, dear friends,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
that my forehead is furrowed.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
With men I live at peace, but with my insides</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I am at war.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
The cricket in his cage</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
by his tomato,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
sings, sings, sings.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Pay attention:</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
a solitary heart</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
is no heart at all.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
In my solitude </div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I have seen very clearly</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
things that are not true.</div>
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
<i>Antonio Machado</i><br />
<i>1875-1939</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>‘Moral Proverbs and Folksongs'</i><br />
translated from the Spanish by <i>Mary G. Berg </i>and <i>Dennis Maloney</i><br />
<br />
<br />
Antonio Cipriano José María y Francisco de Santa Ana Machado y Ruiz, known as Antonio Machado was a Spanish poet and one of the leading figures of the Spanish literary movement known as the Generation of ’98.<br />
<br />
<br />Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-27168871170607747382013-07-24T08:41:00.000-07:002013-07-24T08:42:07.238-07:00THIS IS BAD<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6zF79zf5dvM/Ue_zn9GYfVI/AAAAAAAAFC8/O__CY-xJFSo/s1600/gottfried-benn+320x240.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6zF79zf5dvM/Ue_zn9GYfVI/AAAAAAAAFC8/O__CY-xJFSo/s400/gottfried-benn+320x240.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Someone hands you an English thriller,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
highly recommended.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
You don’t read English.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
You’ve worked up a thirst</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
for something you can’t afford.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
You have deep insights,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
brand new, and they sound</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
like an academic glossing Hoelderlin.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
You hear the waves at night</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
ramping against the shore</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
and you think: that’s what waves do.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Worse: you’re asked out</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
when at home you get better coffee,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
silence, and you don’t expect to be amused.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Awful: not to die in summer</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
under a bright sky</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
when the rich dirt</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
falls easily from the shovel.</div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<i>Gottfried Benn</i><br />
<i>1886-1956</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>‘This is Bad’ </i>translated from the German by <i> Harvey Shapiro</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
<br />
Gottfried Benn was a German essayist, novelist, and expressionist poet. A doctor of medicine, he initially welcomed but soon thereafter criticized the National Socialist regime.<br />
<br />
<br />
Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-62138003901519423892013-07-15T07:44:00.000-07:002013-07-15T07:44:11.790-07:00HAPPINESS<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PgfL22MGJRw/UeQInYR9m_I/AAAAAAAAFCs/FC8eGgPOcrE/s1600/stephen-dunn.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="261" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PgfL22MGJRw/UeQInYR9m_I/AAAAAAAAFCs/FC8eGgPOcrE/s400/stephen-dunn.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Stephen Dunn</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
A state you must dare not enter</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
with hopes of staying,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
quicksand in the marshes, and all</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
the roads leading to a castle</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
that doesn’t exist.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
But there it is, as promised,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
with its perfect bridge above</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
the crocodiles,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
and its doors forever open.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>Stephen Dunn</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>1939-</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Dunn is an American poet who has written fifteen collections of poetry. He won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his 2001 collection, Different Hours and has received an Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Among his other awards are three National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowships, Guggenheim Fellowship, and Rockefeller Foundations Fellowship. </div>
Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-7996561008010472062013-07-10T14:45:00.000-07:002013-07-10T14:45:32.813-07:00OCEANS<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-GMRuV3e9VEs/Udq5GIo6_AI/AAAAAAAAFCM/n_PK8821bUg/s1600/Unknown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="260" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-GMRuV3e9VEs/Udq5GIo6_AI/AAAAAAAAFCM/n_PK8821bUg/s400/Unknown.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I have a feeling that my boat </div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
has struck, down there in the depths,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
against a great thing.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
And nothing</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
happens! Nothing . . . Silence . . .Waves . . .</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
- Nothing happens?</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Or has everything happened,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
and are we standing now, quietly, in the new life?</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>Juan Ramon Jiminez</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>1881-1956</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b style="font-style: italic;">‘Oceans’ </b> translated from the Spanish by <i> Robert Bly</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
Juan Ramón Jiménez Mantecón was a Spanish poet, a prolific writer who received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1956.<br />
<br />Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-68229416294762283682013-07-07T15:11:00.000-07:002013-07-07T15:11:31.381-07:00CONCH<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-uvYcS6WoFTA/Udnlv4uVD-I/AAAAAAAAFB8/gegT_hwM8EM/s1600/Unknown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-uvYcS6WoFTA/Udnlv4uVD-I/AAAAAAAAFB8/gegT_hwM8EM/s400/Unknown.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
In front of the mirror in my parents’ bedroom lay a pink conch. I used to approach it on tiptoes, and with a sudden movement put it against my ears. I wanted to surprise it one day when it wasn’t longing with a monotonous hum for the sea. Although I was small I knew that even if we love someone very much, at times it happens that we forget about it.<br />
<br />
<br />
<i>Zbigniew Herbert</i><br />
<i>1924-1998</i><br />
<br />
<br />
<b>‘Conch’ </b>translated from the Polish by <i>John </i>and <i>Bogdana Carpenter</i><br />
<br />
Zbigniew Herbert was a Polish poet, essayist, drama writer, author of plays, and moralist. A member of the Polish resistance movement during World War II, he is one of the best known and the most translated post-war Polish writers. <br />
<br />
<br />Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-32358072408634342272013-07-02T09:56:00.000-07:002013-07-02T09:56:26.819-07:00RELATIONSHIP<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ws5W3QMBznQ/UcxIG8iE9GI/AAAAAAAAFAk/XFVl57qPXJM/s278/Unknown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="260" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ws5W3QMBznQ/UcxIG8iE9GI/AAAAAAAAFAk/XFVl57qPXJM/s400/Unknown.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
What a silence, when you are here, What</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
a hellish silence.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
You sit and I sit.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
You lose and I lose.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Janos Pilenszky</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>1921-1981</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
translated from the Hungarian by <i>Peter Jay</i></div>
Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-26080670600359244972013-06-29T15:48:00.000-07:002013-06-29T15:48:12.082-07:00WATER-BURN<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-AoxO5XEeOjY/UcxFh34-HbI/AAAAAAAAFAU/PP-JEdvYSW0/s1027/the-large-blue-horses.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="235" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-AoxO5XEeOjY/UcxFh34-HbI/AAAAAAAAFAU/PP-JEdvYSW0/s400/the-large-blue-horses.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The large blue Horse*</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
We should have been galloping on horses, their hoofprints</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Splashes of light, divots kicked out of the darkness,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Or hauling up lobster pots in a wake of sparks. Where</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Were the otters and seals? Were the dolphins on fire?</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Yes, we should have been doing more with our lives.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Michael Longley</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>1939-</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
*The Large Blue Horse </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
by <i> Franz Marc</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>1880-1916</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
German Expressionist Painter</div>
Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-90808941058847737512013-06-27T06:47:00.000-07:002013-06-27T06:47:07.262-07:00DELAY<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Mz06iAplmes/Ucw_6965zUI/AAAAAAAAFAE/bRXpxedUPwQ/s500/HUDEEP_s.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="348" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Mz06iAplmes/Ucw_6965zUI/AAAAAAAAFAE/bRXpxedUPwQ/s400/HUDEEP_s.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Hubble Extreme Deep Field*</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
The radiance of that star that leans on me</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Was shining years ago. The light that now</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Glitters up there my eye may never see,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
And so the time lag teases me with how</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Love that loves now may not reach me until</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Its first desire is spent. The star’s impulse</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Must wait for eyes to claim it beautiful</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
And love arrived may find us somewhere else.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Elizabeth Jennings</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>1926-2001</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<br />
<div style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify;">
<b>*The Hubble Extreme Deep Field</b><br /><b></b></div>
<div style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify;">
NASA, ESA, UCSC, Leiden Obs and the XDF Team.</div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">This image by the Hubble Space telescope is the deepest image of the far Universe ever taken in visible light. The faintest galaxies formed 13 billion years ago, just a few percent of its present age. </span>Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-39830611376984458322013-05-19T15:43:00.004-07:002013-05-19T15:43:45.091-07:00I’LL BE A WICKED OLD WOMAN<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tXab3JSYqxQ/UZlPlJfPCFI/AAAAAAAAE6I/e7h7_EvQAHI/s1600/13570683204bbaeb3ec047e301033442_orig.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="295" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tXab3JSYqxQ/UZlPlJfPCFI/AAAAAAAAE6I/e7h7_EvQAHI/s400/13570683204bbaeb3ec047e301033442_orig.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
I’ll be a wicked old woman,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
thin as a rail,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
the way I am now.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Not one of those big-assed ones</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
with buttocks churning behind them,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
as Celine said.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Not one of the good-natured grandmas and aunties</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
against whose soft and plump arms</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
it is nice to lay one’s cheek.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I’m more like a scarecrow</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
in our gardens full of rosy tomatoes</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
like children’s cheeks.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
There are some old crones</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
who are both vivacious and angry as a bee</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
with eyes on top of their heads</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
who see everything, hear everything and have an opinion -</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
grumblers since birth.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I’ll squawk and chatter all day,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
cackle like a hen over her chicks</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
about the days when I was</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
a young, good-looking girl.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
When I led boys by the nose.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Colts and stallions I tamed,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
with the flash in my eyes, the flash of my skirt,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
passing over infidelities and miseries</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
the way a general passes over his lost battles.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I’ll be free to do anything as an old woman,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
among things I still can and want to do</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
like playing bridge or dancing</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
the light-footed dances of my days.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I’ll spin and trip on my stick-like legs,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
attached to my body like toothpicks to a kabob.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
That old hag sure can boogie!</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
The young smarties gathered around me</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
will shout and applaud.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
An old woman like a well-baked bun with sesame seeds,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
that’s what I’m going to be like.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I’ll stick between everyone’s teeth, as I did before,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
while with a wide hat and dresses down to the ground</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I stroll through the landscapes of my past life.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Smelling the furze, admiring the heather,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
on every thistle catching my undergarment - my soul.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>Radmila Lazic</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>1949</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
translated from the Serbian by <i>Charles Simic</i> </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
BEING ALIVE</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Bloodaxe Books</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
Radmila Lazic is a leading Serbian poet and activist. Born in 1949, she has published six award-winning poetry collections as well as anthologies of anti-war letters and women poets. She is founder and editor of the journal Profemina.<br />
<br />
Born in Serbia, Charles Simic is one of America’s leading poets. He won the 1990 Pulitzer Prize. His own poetry is published in Britain by Faber. He teaches at the University of New Hampshire.<br />
<br />
<br />Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-86017978134797125652013-04-30T10:20:00.001-07:002013-04-30T10:25:48.759-07:00From LINES COMPOSED A FEW MILES ABOVE TINTERN ABBEY<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-GPJkABmrVWo/UX_3k9V5dVI/AAAAAAAAE0E/nsbIrvg3OYA/s1600/Unknown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-GPJkABmrVWo/UX_3k9V5dVI/AAAAAAAAE0E/nsbIrvg3OYA/s400/Unknown.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
For I have learned<br />
To look on nature, not as in the hour<br />
Of thoughtless youth, but hearing oftentimes<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
The still, sad music of humanity,<br />
Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power<br />
To chasten and subdue. And I have felt<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
A presence that disturbs me with the joy<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime<br />
Of something far more deeply interfused,<br />
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,<br />
And the round ocean, and the living air,<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man,<br />
A motion and a spirit, that impels<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
All thinking things, all objects of all thought,<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still<br />
A lover of the meadows and the woods,<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
And mountains; and of all that we behold<br />
From this green earth; of all the mighty world<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
Of eye and ear, both what they half-create,<br />
And what perceive; well pleased to recognize<br />
In nature and the language of the sense,<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse,<br />
The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
Of all my moral being.<br />
<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<i>William Wordsworth</i></div>
<div>
<i>1770-1850</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
William Wordsworth was a major English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with the 1798 joint publication Lyrical Ballads.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The full text of <i>Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey can be found <a href="http://www.rc.umd.edu/rchs/reader/tabbey.html">here.</a></i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br />
My source:<br />
<b>Poetry For The Spirit</b><br />
<b>Poems of Universal Wisdom And Beauty</b><br />
<b>Edited by Alan Jacobs</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-16863556870614286792013-04-23T10:44:00.000-07:002013-04-23T10:44:22.811-07:00NOT MY BEST SIDE<div style="text-align: center;">
</div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/--I1fANYcfzg/UXbHHsh6xdI/AAAAAAAAEzE/HUOOXlZdr78/s1600/uccello.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="315" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/--I1fANYcfzg/UXbHHsh6xdI/AAAAAAAAEzE/HUOOXlZdr78/s400/uccello.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Uccello: St George and The Dragon, National Gallery</div>
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<br /></div>
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I</div>
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<br /></div>
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Not my best side, I'm afraid.</div>
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The artist didn't give me a chance to</div>
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Pose properly, and as you can see,</div>
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Poor chap, he had this obsession with</div>
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Triangles, so he left off two of my</div>
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Feet. I didn't comment at the time</div>
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(What, after all, are two feet</div>
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To a monster?) but afterwards</div>
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I was sorry for the bad publicity.</div>
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Why, I said to myself, should my conqueror</div>
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Be so ostentatiously beardless, and ride</div>
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A horse with a deformed neck and square hoofs?</div>
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Why should my victim be so</div>
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Unattractive as to be inedible,</div>
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And why should she have me literally</div>
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On a string? I don't mind dying</div>
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Ritually, since I always rise again,</div>
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But I should have liked a little more blood</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
To show they were taking me seriously.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
II</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
It's hard for a girl to be sure if</div>
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She wants to be rescued. I mean, I quite</div>
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Took to the dragon. It's nice to be</div>
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Liked, if you know what I mean. He was</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
So nicely physical, with his claws</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
And lovely green skin, and that sexy tail,</div>
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And the way he looked at me,</div>
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He made me feel he was all ready to</div>
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Eat me. And any girl enjoys that.</div>
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So when this boy turned up, wearing machinery,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
On a really dangerous horse, to be honest</div>
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I didn't much fancy him. I mean,</div>
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What was he like underneath the hardware?</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
He might have acne, blackheads or even</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Bad breath for all I could tell, but the dragon--</div>
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Well, you could see all his equipment</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
At a glance. Still, what could I do?</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
The dragon got himself beaten by the boy,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
And a girl's got to think of her future.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
III</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I have diplomas in Dragon</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Management and Virgin Reclamation.</div>
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My horse is the latest model, with</div>
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Automatic transmission and built-in</div>
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Obsolescence. My spear is custom-built,</div>
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And my prototype armour</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Still on the secret list. You can't</div>
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Do better than me at the moment.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I'm qualified and equipped to the</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Eyebrow. So why be difficult?</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Don't you want to be killed and/or rescued</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
In the most contemporary way? Don't</div>
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You want to carry out the roles</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
That sociology and myth have designed for you?</div>
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Don't you realize that, by being choosy,</div>
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You are endangering job prospects</div>
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In the spear- and horse-building industries?</div>
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What, in any case, does it matter what</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
You want? You're in my way.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>U.A. Fanthorpe</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>1929-2009</i></div>
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<br /></div>
Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-26451900130229069462013-04-22T15:30:00.001-07:002013-04-22T15:31:55.325-07:00I SO LIKED SPRING<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-p4W-w1j-LDw/UXW4hyAIhII/AAAAAAAAEyc/tFU3h_ctUO0/s1600/charlotte_mew.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="100" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-p4W-w1j-LDw/UXW4hyAIhII/AAAAAAAAEyc/tFU3h_ctUO0/s400/charlotte_mew.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
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I so liked Spring last year</div>
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Because you were here; -</div>
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The thrushes too -</div>
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Because it was these you liked to hear -</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I so liked you.</div>
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<br /></div>
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This year’s a different thing, -</div>
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I’ll not think of you.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
But I’ll like Spring because it is simply Spring</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
As the thrushes do.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>Charlotte Mew</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>1869-1928</i></div>
Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-73320147132441521572013-04-16T14:59:00.000-07:002013-04-16T15:00:29.904-07:00MEN IN THE CITY<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cdxk_hMuAbw/UW3GHkysXEI/AAAAAAAAEwE/BtK-J663pvE/s1600/Alfonsina_Storni_El_ltimo_rom_ntico.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cdxk_hMuAbw/UW3GHkysXEI/AAAAAAAAEwE/BtK-J663pvE/s400/Alfonsina_Storni_El_ltimo_rom_ntico.jpg" width="293" /></a></div>
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Alfonsina Storni</div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
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The woods of the horizon </div>
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are on fire;</div>
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eluding flames,</div>
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the swift blue bucks</div>
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of twilight</div>
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cross.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Little golden goats</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
migrate toward</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
the vault</div>
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and recline</div>
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on the blue moss.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Below,</div>
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the city </div>
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rises up,</div>
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a cement rose,</div>
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motionless on its stem</div>
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of dark cellars.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Its black pistils -</div>
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towers, cupolas -</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
emerge,</div>
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waiting for lunar </div>
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pollen.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Suffocated</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
by the flames of the fire</div>
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and lost</div>
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among the petals of the rose,</div>
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almost invisible,</div>
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crossing back and forth</div>
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the men . . .</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>Alfonsina Storni</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>1892-1938</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>Men in the City</i> translated from the Spanish by <i>Rachel Benson</i></div>
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<br /></div>
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Alfonsina Storni was born at sea to Argentine parents who registered her birth in Switzerland.<i> </i>She lived for most of her life in Buenos Aires. Self-supporting from the age of thirteen, she travelled with a theatre company, wrote plays for children, worked as a teacher, a milliner, and a journalist. She had one son. The publication of her first book in 1916 brought immediate recognition, and she was soon accorded the stature of a major poet throughout Latin America. In 1938, incurably ill, she drowned herself in the waters of Mar del Plata.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>From the Penguin Book of Women Poets 1978</i></div>
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<br /></div>
Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-42170676408913516612013-04-05T15:31:00.000-07:002013-04-05T15:31:57.836-07:00SLOW RAIN<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-EzSiSF2T2aQ/UV9MYBN6VUI/AAAAAAAAEuM/AQuLW2fsunE/s1600/Retrato_de_Gabriela_Mistral.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-EzSiSF2T2aQ/UV9MYBN6VUI/AAAAAAAAEuM/AQuLW2fsunE/s400/Retrato_de_Gabriela_Mistral.jpg" width="373" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
This water, sad and fearful,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
like a child who suffers,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
before touching the Earth,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
fades away.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Calm the wind, calm the tree -</div>
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but in the tremendous silence,</div>
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this lean, bitter song</div>
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is falling.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
The sky is like a heart,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
immense, opening up, bitter,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
it is not rain; it is a bleeding,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
long, and slow.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Men in houses</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
do not feel this bitterness,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
this sad flow of water</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
out of the heavens.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
This long and tiring descent</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
of conquered water,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
towards Earth, recumbent,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
and paralysed!</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
It is raining . . . . and like a tragic jackal</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
the night watches over the land.</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
What is going to spring up, in the shadow,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
out of Mother Earth?</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Will you sleep, while outside</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
falls suffering, this slow water,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
this lethal water, sister</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
of death?</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>Gabriela Mistral</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>1889-1957</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
translated from the Spanish by <i>Gunda Kaiser</i> and<i> James Tipton</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>‘Gabriela Mistral’ </i>was the pseudonym of <i>Lucila Godoy Alcayaga </i>who was born in Vicuna, Chile. She received literary acclaim in 1915 with her <i>‘Sonetos de Muerte’ </i>and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1945. She is considered one of the great lyrical geniuses of Spanish letter.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">(From the Penguin Book of Women Poets, 1979)</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-24269598206803375482013-03-29T10:36:00.000-07:002013-03-30T03:49:38.787-07:00A NOCTURNAL REVERIE<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-EvFtJLZcopg/UVXOWeZgJcI/AAAAAAAAEtk/ludQo_537U0/s1600/images-1.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="299" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-EvFtJLZcopg/UVXOWeZgJcI/AAAAAAAAEtk/ludQo_537U0/s400/images-1.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<br />
In such a night, when every louder wind<br />
Is to its distant cavern safe confined;<br />
And only gentle Zephyr fans his wings,<br />
And lonely Philomel, still waking, sings;<br />
Or from some tree, famed for the owl’s delight,<br />
She, hollowing clear, directs the wand’rer right:<br />
In such a night, when passing clouds give place,<br />
Or thinly veil the heav’ns’ mysterious face;<br />
When in some river, overhung with green,<br />
The waving moon and the trembling leaves are seen;<br />
When freshened grass now bears itself upright,<br />
And makes cool banks to pleasing rest invite,<br />
Whence springs the woodbind, and the bramble-rose,<br />
And where the sleepy cowslip sheltered grows;<br />
Whilst now a paler hue the foxglove takes,<br />
Yet checquers still with red the dusky brakes<br />
When scatter’d glow-worms, but in twilight fine,<br />
Shew trivial beauties, watch their hour to shine;<br />
Whilst Salisb’ry stands the test of every light,<br />
In perfect charms, and perfect virtue bright:<br />
When odours, which declined repelling day,<br />
Through temp’rate air uninterrupted stray;<br />
When darkened groves their softest shadows wear,<br />
And falling waters we distinctly hear;<br />
When through the gloom more venerable shows<br />
Some ancient fabric, awful in repose,<br />
While sunburnt hills their swarthy looks conceal,<br />
And swelling haycocks thicken up the vale:<br />
When the loosed horse now, as his pasture leads,<br />
Comes slowly grazing through th’ adjoining meads,<br />
Whose stealing pace, and lengthened shade we fear,<br />
Till torn-up forage in his teeth we hear:<br />
When nibbling sheep at large pursue their food,<br />
And unmolested kine rechew the cud;<br />
When curlews cry beneath the village walls,<br />
And to her straggling brood the partridge calls;<br />
Their shortlived jubilee the creatures keep,<br />
Which but endures, whilst tyrant man does sleep;<br />
When a sedate content the spirit feels,<br />
And no fierce light disturbs, whilst it reveals;<br />
But silent musings urge the mind to seek<br />
Something, too high for syllables to speak;<br />
Till the free soul to a composedness charmed,<br />
Finding the elements of rage disarmed,<br />
O’er all below a solemn quiet grown,<br />
Joys in th’ inferior world, and thinks it like her own:<br />
In such a night let me abroad remain,<br />
Till morning breaks, and all’s confused again;<br />
Our cares, our toils, our clamors are renewed,<br />
Or pleasures, seldom reached, again pursued.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<i>Anne Finch, Countess of Winchilsea</i><br />
<i>1661-1720</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
Born near Southampton, she became a maid of honour to mary of Modena, duchess of York. She married in 1684 Heneage Finch, later fifth Earl of Winchilsea, and published during her lifetime a poem, <i> 'The Spleen’ (1701) and a volume of poems (1713).</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>(The Penguin Book of Women Poets 1978)</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
<br />
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Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-71928192768112029132013-03-27T13:19:00.000-07:002013-03-27T13:19:58.703-07:00HER KIND<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I have gone out, a possessed witch,<br />
haunting the black air, braver at night;<br />
dreaming evil, I have done my hitch<br />
over the plain houses, light by light:<br />
lonely thing, twelve-fingered, out of mind.<br />
A woman like that is not a woman, quite.<br />
I have been her kind.<br />
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I have found the warm caves in the woods,<br />
filled them with skillets, carvings, shelves,<br />
closets, silks, innumerable goods;<br />
fixed the suppers for the worms and the elves:<br />
whining, rearranging the disaligned.<br />
A woman like that is misunderstood.<br />
I have been her kind.<br />
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I have ridden in your cart, driver,<br />
waved my nude arms at villages going by,<br />
learning the last bright routes, survivor<br />
where your flames still bite my thigh<br />
and my ribs crack where your wheels wind.<br />
A woman like that is not ashamed to die.<br />
I have been her kind.<br />
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<i>Anne Sexton</i><br />
<i>1928-1974</i><br />
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‘Her Kind’ is from Sexton’s collection <i>‘To Bedlam and Part Way Back’. </i>In July 1959<i>, </i>whilst looking for a keynote poem for the first section of the book, Sexton revisited an old, previously unpublished poem “Night Voice on a Broomstick’. One week and 19 pages of drafts later ‘Her Kind’ was born. From this point on, ‘Her Kind’ became her signature poem, the one with which Sexton began all her alcohol-fuelled poetry readings. (<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">From Poem For The Day Two - Chatto and Windus, London 2005)</span><br />
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From ‘The Selected Poems of Anne Sexton’, Virago Press, reprinted 1993<br />
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Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3591855068230593292.post-40554804021404943032013-03-18T15:15:00.000-07:002013-03-18T15:15:20.102-07:00Don’t Give Me The Whole Truth<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Don’t give me the whole truth,</div>
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don’t give me the sea for my thirst,</div>
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don’t give me the sky when I ask for light,</div>
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but give me a glint, a dewy wisp, a mote</div>
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as the birds bear water-drops from their bathing</div>
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and the wind a grain of salt.</div>
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<i>Olav H Hauge</i></div>
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<i>1908-1994</i></div>
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lived all his life in Ulvik, a village in the west of Norway on the Hardangerfjord. He translated many English and American writers into Norwegian.</div>
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‘Don’t Give Me The Whole Truth’ was translated from the Norwegian by <i>Robin Fulton</i></div>
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from the anthology<i> ‘Being Human’,</i></div>
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the companion anthology to ‘<i>Being Alive’ </i>and <i>‘Staying Alive’</i></div>
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edited by <i>Neil Astley</i></div>
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Bloodaxe Books</div>
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Frikohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.com