Poem of the Day

[KnottedYet]

I don't think I can get the spacing of the lines right, but we'll give this a try.


D@MN THIRSTY

First
The fish needs to say,

"Something ain't right about this
Camel ride--

And I'm
Feeling so d@mn

Thirsty."

-Shams-ud-uddin Muhammmad Hafiz (c. 1320-1389 A.D.)
Translated by Daniel Ladinsky

[margo49]

AHHH , Hafez

A liberal translation to say the least.

Yeah, the missing link between Islam and Zen.

Has anyone else noticed that Knot is reading a lot of poetry lately?

'nuff said...

[KnottedYet]

I've always read a lot of poetry. Turned it into a Bachelor's degree, too. Edited a poetry magazine briefly. Very briefly.

Not too bad at writing parodies (anybody remember "The Naming of Bikes"?) but otherwise can't write my way out of a wet paper bag.

I like reading poetry.
Novels are too long for my limited attention span.;)

[Bad JuJu]

The Red Bicycle (with apologies to William Carlos Williams)

So much depends
upon
a red
bicycle
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
panniers.

[KnottedYet]

An oldie, but a goodie...


WILD GEESE

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting --
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Mary Oliver, "Dream Work" 1986.

[Brandi]

I need moonscreen not
sunscreen it's the nights
the age me fastest it's
the neon girls girls girls
sighn and the light from
aol and yahoo I need some
screenscreen and a bottle of
porn block but they make that.

Exene Cervenka " a beer on every page" 2003

[Kitsune06]

Drumming fingers
waiting
for time to pass
wearing
hopes like old clothes
feeling
seconds like hours.

[Brandi]

Oh this is fun!

[Kitsune06]

Caffeine is my shepherd; I shall not doze.
It maketh me to wake in green pastures.
It leadeth me beyond the sleeping masses.
It restoreth my buzz.
It leadeth me in the paths of consciousness for its name's sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of addiction,
I will fear no Equal -
For thou art with me;
Thy cream and thy sugar they comfort me.
Thou preparest a carafe before me in the presence of The Starbucks.
Thou anointest my day with pep; my mug runneth over.
Surely richness and taste shall follow me all the days of my life,
And I will dwell in the House of Mocha forever.

[KnottedYet]

Dharma


The way the dog trots out the front door
every morning
without a hat or an umbrella,
without any money
or the keys to her doghouse
never fails to fill the saucer of my heart
with milky admiration.

Who provides a finer example
of a life without encumbrance--
Thoreau in his curtainless hut
with a single plate, a single spoon?
Gandhi with his staff and his holy diapers?

Off she goes into the material world
with nothing but her brown coat
and her modest blue collar,
following only her wet nose,
the twin portals of her steady breathing,
followed only by the plume of her tail.

If only she did not shove the cat aside
every morning
and eat all his food
what a model of self-containment she would be,
what a paragon of earthly detachment.
If only she were not so eager
for a rub behind the ears,
so acrobatic in her welcomes,
if only I were not her god.

Billy Collins, 2001.

[Brandi]

Oh I like Billy!

[Bad JuJu]

WILD GEESE

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting --
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Mary Oliver, "Dream Work" 1986.
My yoga teacher read this poem last Friday! She always reads a poem as we begin our practice, and she uses Mary Oliver's a lot. I love Oliver!

I esp. love that bit about letting "the soft animal of your body/ love what it loves"--ahhhhhhh...........

[Bad JuJu]

Sleep

The young dog would like to know
why we sit so long in one place
intent on a box that makes the same
noises and has no smell whatever.
Get out! Get out! we tell him
when he asks us by licking the back
of our hand, which has small hairs,
almost like his. Other times he finds us
motionless with papers in our lap,
or at a desk looking into a humming
square of light. Soon the dog understands
we are not looking, exactly, but sleeping
with our eyes open, then goes to sleep
himself. Is it us he cries out to,
moving his legs somewhere beyond
the rooms where we spend our lives?
We don't think to ask, upset
as we are in the end with the dog,
who has begun throwing the old,
shabby coat of himself down on every
floor or rug in the apartment, sleep,
we say, all that damn dog does is sleep.

Wesley McNair, 2002

[KnottedYet]

Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song
A medley of extemporanea
And love is a thing that can never go wrong
And I am Marie of Roumania

--Dorothy Parker

[Kitsune06]

THE BODY grows outside,—
The more convenient way,—
That if the spirit like to hide,
Its temple stands alway

Ajar, secure, inviting; 5
It never did betray
The soul that asked its shelter
In timid honesty.
-Emily D!ckinson

[margo49]

Ah... our solitary friend of great insight and sensitivity!

[enzed]

Alfred Lord Tennyson - Break Break Break


Break, break, break
On thy cold grey stones, O Sea!
And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me.

O well for the fisherman's boy,
That he shouts with his sister at play!
O well for the sailor lad,
That he sings in his boat on the bay!

And the stately ships go on
To their haven under the hill;
But O for the touch of a vanished hand,
And the sound of a voice that is still!

Break, break, break
At the foot of thy crags, O Sea!
But the tender grace of a day that is dead
Will never come back to me.


I studied this poetry in 5th Form English. It's a rather sad poem, I suppose it's a reflection of the poet's life (which was not always a happy one)
There's this quant cementry overlooking a valley near where I grew up. On one of the headstones, the third verse is quoted. [But O for the touch of a vanished hand,
And the sound of a voice that is still!]
It's quite sad yet romantic - A story of a lost love

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Another of my fav poets, whom I studied at school, is Wilfred Owen.
Whilst the poems have a sad overtone, they give a clear message - war is furtile

Anthem for Doomed Youth
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
-Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells;
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,-
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.


What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of good-byes.
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds

[KnottedYet]

I like that the last line takes on some of the metric qualities of the last measures of "Taps". ( **- feet rather than *- feet)

[enzed]

Here's one of my favourite romantic poets.


Elizabeth Barret Browning - Sonnets from the Portuguese

XLIII
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of everyday`s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle - light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood`s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints, - I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! - and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

---------------------------------------------------------------
In high school I had the same english teacher for 3 years in a row.
She taught me to enjoy poetry and to appreciate Shakespeare (Over ten years later, I can still remember most of the words from "That Time of year" off by heart)

[margo49]

Nothing like knowing stuff by heart.
A few months ago I read this piece where this Christian Nun said we should learn a lot of stuff by heart because at the sticky end all you will have is your memory so there'd better be something in it.
Staves off Alzheimer's too in the meantime!

[KnottedYet]

excerpt from Morning Song of Senlin

It is morning, I awake from a bed of silence,
Shining I rise from the starless waters of sleep.
The walls are about me still as in the evening,
I am the same, and the same name still I keep.

The earth revolves with me, yet makes no motion,
The stars pale silently in a coral sky.
In a whistling void I stand before my mirror,
Unconcerned and tie my tie.

There are horses neighing on far-off hills
Tossing their long white manes,
And mountains flash in the rose-white dusk,
Their shoulders black with rains...
It is morning. I stand by the mirror
And surprise my soul once more;
The blue air rushes above my ceiling,
There are suns beneath my floor...

--Conrad Aiken