August 17th

Related poetry:

1. August When my eyes are weeds, And my lips are petals, spinning Down the wind that has beginning Where the crumpled beeches start In a fringe of salty reeds; When my arms are elder-bushes, And the rangy lilac pushes Upward, upward through my heart; Summer, do your worst! Light your tinsel moon, and call on Your […]...
2. August Why should this Negro insolently stride Down the red noonday on such noiseless feet? Piled in his barrow, tawnier than wheat, Lie heaps of smouldering daisies, sombre-eyed, Their copper petals shriveled up with pride, Hot with a superfluity of heat, Like a great brazier borne along the street By captive leopards, black and burning pied. […]...
3. Dream Song 94: Ill lay he long, upon this last return Ill lay he long, upon this last return, Unvisited. The doctors put everything in the hospital Into reluctant Henry And the nurses took it out & put it back, Smiling like fiends, with their eternal ‘we.’ Henry did a slow burn, Collapsing his dialogue to their white ears & shiny on the flanges. Sanka he […]...
4. August When the blackberries hang Swollen in the woods, in the brambles Nobody owns, I spend All day among the high Branches, reaching My ripped arms, thinking Of nothing, cramming The black honey of summer Into my mouth; all day my body Accepts what it is. In the dark Creeks that run by there is This […]...
5. August 8th And do not be indiscreet or unconventional. Play it safe. Listen here. I’ve never played it safe In spite of what the critics say. Ask my imaginary brother, that waif, That childhood best friend who comes to play Dress-up and stick-up and jacks and Pick-Up-Sticks, Bike downtown, stick out tongues at the Catholics. Or form […]...
6. Dedication To M Swing of the heart. O firmly hung, fastened on what Invisible branch. Who, who gave you the push, That you swung with me into the leaves? How near I was to the exquisite fruits. But not-staying Is the essence of this motion. Only the nearness, only Toward the forever-too-high, all at once the possible Nearness. […]...
7. Floss won't save you from an Abyss Floss won’t save you from an Abyss But a Rope will Notwithstanding a Rope for a Souvenir Is not beautiful But I tell you every step is a Trough And every stop a Well Now will you have the Rope or the Floss? Prices reasonable...
8. Dark August So much rain, so much life like the swollen sky Of this black August. My sister, the sun, Broods in her yellow room and won’t come out. Everything goes to hell; the mountains fume Like a kettle, rivers overrun; still, She will not rise and turn off the rain. She is in her room, fondling […]...
9. Sonnet L LOng languishing in double malady, Of my harts wound and of my bodies greife: There came to me a leach that would apply Fit medicines for my bodies best reliefe. Vayne man (quod I) that hast but little priefe: In deep discouery of the mynds disease, Is not the hart of all the body chiefe? […]...
10. Make me a picture of the sun Make me a picture of the sun So I can hang it in my room And make believe I’m getting warm When others call it “Day”! Draw me a Robin on a stem So I am hearing him, I’ll dream, And when the Orchards stop their tune Put my pretense away Say if it’s really […]...
11. August 15 My new Web site is dropdead. com It’s interactive you get to choose how You’ll die, where, and at what age And it’ll still come as a complete Surprise to you I guarantee But let’s not get morbid it’s a game It’s more fun than bullshit. com and a lot less Narcissistic than kissmyass. com […]...
12. The School In August The cloakroom pegs are empty now, And locked the classroom door, The hollow desks are lined with dust, And slow across the floor A sunbeam creeps between the chairs Till the sun shines no more. Who did their hair before this glass? Who scratched ‘Elaine loves Jill’ One drowsy summer sewing-class With scissors on the […]...
13. Examples (August 27) The last Campbell’s tomato soup can Of the twentieth century is going to The Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh That is an example of a sentence Another is this from a CEO in Fortune “You die in either case, but this way you get To do it proactively,” where the adverb Makes the sentence I’m […]...
14. Potions The old woman made mint Candy for the children Who’d bolt through her front door, Silhouettes of the great blue Heron. She sold ten-dollar potions From a half-lit kitchen. Chinese boxes Furnished with fliers & sinkers. Sassafras & lizard tongues. They’d walk out Of the woods or drive in from cities, Clutching lovesick dollar bills […]...
15. JIMMY ( A Poem in Remembrance) Bhaskar Roy Barman Jimmy, A black, snub-nosed bitch, a jaw shoved out, Your eyes throwing forward a wrinkled reproachful look, Your fur so brindled as to give one to understand You were not pure, Receded into oblivion. Suddenly you intruded into our memory When we were observing the third death […]...
16. A Portrait in Georgia Hair-braided chestnut, Coiled like a lyncher’s rope, Eyes-fagots, Lips-old scars, or the first red blisters, Breath-the last sweet scent of cane, And her slim body, white as the ash Of black flesh after flame....
17. An August Midnight I A shaded lamp and a waving blind, And the beat of a clock from a distant floor: On this scene enter winged, horned, and spined – A longlegs, a moth, and a dumbledore; While ‘mid my page there idly stands A sleepy fly, that rubs its hands. . . II Thus meet we five, […]...
18. A Calendar of Sonnets: August Silence again. The glorious symphony Hath need of pause and interval of peace. Some subtle signal bids all sweet sounds cease, Save hum of insects’ aimless industry. Pathetic summer seeks by blazonry Of color to conceal her swift decrease. Weak subterfuge! Each mocking day doth fleece A blossom, and lay bare her poverty. Poor middle-aged […]...
19. Dream Song 67: I don't operate often. When I do I don’t operate often. When I do, Persons take note. Nurses look amazed. They pale. The patient is brought back to life, or so. The reason I don’t do this more (I quote) Is: I have a living to fail— Because of my wife & son—to keep from earning. €”Mr Bones, I sees that. They […]...
20. The Ballad Of A Bachelor Listen, ladies, while I sing The ballad of John Henry King. John Henry was a bachelor, His age was thirty-three or four. Two maids for his affection vied, And each desired to be his bride, And bravely did they strive to bring Unto their feet John Henry King. John Henry liked them both so well, […]...
21. 30. Song-Composed in August NOW westlin winds and slaught’ring guns Bring Autumn’s pleasant weather; The moorcock springs on whirring wings Amang the blooming heather: Now waving grain, wide o’er the plain, Delights the weary farmer; And the moon shines bright, when I rove at night, To muse upon my charmer. The partridge loves the fruitful fells, The plover loves […]...
22. Putting in the Seed You come to fetch me from my work to-night When supper’s on the table, and we’ll see If I can leave off burying the white Soft petals fallen from the apple tree (Soft petals, yes, but not so barren quite, Mingled with these, smooth bean and wrinkled pea); And go along with you ere you […]...
23. Portrait Of A Lady Your thighs are appletrees Whose blossoms touch the sky. Which sky? The sky Where Watteau hung a lady’s Slipper. Your knees Are a southern breeze-or A gust of snow. Agh! what Sort of man was Fragonard? -As if that answered Anything.-Ah, yes. Below The knees, since the tune Drops that way, it is One of […]...
24. Galatea Encore As though the mercury’s under its tongue, it won’t Talk. As though with the mercury in its sphincter, Immobile, by a leaf-coated pond A statue stands white like a blight of winter. After such snow, there is nothing indeed: the ins And outs of centuries, pestered heather. That’s what coming full circle means – When […]...
25. The Merman I Who would be A merman gay, Singing alone, Sitting alone, With a mermaid’s knee, For instance hey For a throne? II I would be a merman gay; I would sit and sing the whole day long; I would fill my lungs with the strongest brine, And squirt it up in a spray of song, […]...
26. Drunk As Drunk Drunk as drunk on turpentine From your open kisses, Your wet body wedged Between my wet body and the strake Of our boat that is made of flowers, Feasted, we guide it – our fingers Like tallows adorned with yellow metal – Over the sky’s hot rim, The day’s last breath in our sails. Pinned […]...
27. The Lake Isle O God, O Venus, O Mercury, patron of thieves, Give me in due time, I beseech you, a little tobacco-shop, With the little bright boxes Piled up neatly upon the shelves And the loose fragment cavendish And the shag, And the bright Virginia Loose under the bright glass cases, And a pair of scales Not […]...
28. Patience Be patient with you? When the stooping sky Leans down upon the hills And tenderly, as one who soothing stills An anguish, gathers earth to lie Embraced and girdled. Do the sun-filled men Feel patience then? Be patient with you? When the snow-girt earth Cracks to let through a spurt Of sudden green, and from […]...
29. The Earth God loafs around heaven, Without a shape But He would like to smoke His cigar Or bite His fingernails And so forth. God owns heaven But He craves the earth, The earth with its little sleepy caves, Its bird resting at the kitchen window, Even its murders lined up like broken chairs, Even its writers […]...
30. Roger Heston Oh many times did Ernest Hyde and I Argue about the freedom of the will. My favorite metaphor was Prickett’s cow Roped out to grass, and free you know as far As the length of the rope. One day while arguing so, watching the cow Pull at the rope to get beyond the circle Which […]...
31. In Progress Ten years ago it seemed impossible That she should ever grow so calm as this, With self-remembrance in her warmest kiss And dim dried eyes like an exhausted well. Slow-speaking when she had some fact to tell, Silent with long-unbroken silences, Centered in self yet not unpleased to please, Gravely monotonous like a passing bell. […]...
32. A Story For Rose On The Midnight Flight To Boston Until tonight they were separate specialties, Different stories, the best of their own worst. Riding my warm cabin home, I remember Betsy’s Laughter; she laughed as you did, Rose, at the first Story. Someday, I promised her, I’ll be someone Going somewhere and we plotted it in the humdrum School for proper girls. The next […]...
33. Ice Handler I KNOW an ice handler who wears a flannel shirt with Pearl buttons the size of a dollar, And he lugs a hundred-pound hunk into a saloon ice- Box, helps himself to cold ham and rye bread, Tells the bartender it’s hotter than yesterday and will be Hotter yet to-morrow, by Jesus, And is on […]...
34. The Last Words Of My English Grandmother There were some dirty plates And a glass of milk Beside her on a small table Near the rank, disheveled bed- Wrinkled and nearly blind She lay and snored Rousing with anger in her tones To cry for food, Gimme something to eat- They’re starving me- I’m all right I won’t go To the hospital. […]...
35. Blossom In April The ponds open Like black blossoms, The moon Swims in every one; There’s fire Everywhere: frogs shouting Their desire, Their satisfaction. What We know: that time Chops at us all like an iron Hoe, that death Is a state of paralysis. What We long for: joy Before death, nights In the swale – […]...
36. Chords IN the morning, a Sunday morning, shadows of sea and adumbrants of rock in her eyes… horseback in leather boots and leather gauntlets by the sea. In the evening, a Sunday evening, a rope of pearls on her white shoulders… and a speaking, brooding black velvet, relapsing to the voiceless… battering Russian marches on a […]...
37. Gardening Pruning the rosebush The ache of the summer heat On my shoulders, The feel of the living stalk Between fingers, Petals – one, another, Then another Seek ground, life Not strong enough to hold on. Whether it’s blood Or petals, the gift Of time is a thread I stand on, Feet covered In the soft […]...
38. Cotton Song Come, brother, come. Lets lift it; Come now, hewit! roll away! Shackles fall upon the Judgment Day But lets not wait for it. God’s body’s got a soul, Bodies like to roll the soul, Cant blame God if we dont roll, Come, brother, roll, roll! Cotton bales are the fleecy way, Weary sinner’s bare feet […]...
39. Coral This coral’s hape ecohes the hand It hollowed. Its Immediate absence is heavy. As pumice, As your breast in my cupped palm. Sea-cold, its nipple rasps like sand, Its pores, like yours, shone with salt sweat. Bodies in absence displace their weight, And your smooth body, like none other, Creates an exact absence like this […]...
40. The Fallen Angels They come on to my clean Sheet of paper and leave a Rorschach blot. They do not do this to be mean, They do it to give me a sign They want me, as Aubrey Beardsley once said, To shove it around till something comes. Clumsy as I am, I do it. For I am […]...