The Frog Prince
Frau Doktor, Mama Brundig, Take out your contacts, Remove your wig. I write for you. I entertain. But frogs come out Of the sky like rain. Frogs arrive With an ugly fury. You are
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
The Fury Of Cooks
Herbs, garlic, Cheese, please let me in! Souffles, salad, Parker House rolls, Please let me in! Cook Helen, Why are you so cross, Why is your kitchen verboten? Couldn’t you just teach me To
The Exorcists
And I solemnly swear On the chill of secrecy That I know you not, this room never, The swollen dress I wear, Nor the anonymous spoons that free me, Nor this calendar nor the
The Death Baby
1. DREAMS I was an ice baby. I turned to sky blue. My tears became two glass beads. My mouth stiffened into a dumb howl. They say it was a dream But I remember
Anna Who Was Mad
Anna who was mad, I have a knife in my armpit. When I stand on tiptoe I tap out messages. Am I some sort of infection? Did I make you go insane? Did I
The Ballad Of The Lonely Masturbator
The end of the affair is always death. She’s my workshop. Slippery eye, Out of the tribe of myself my breath Finds you gone. I horrify Those who stand by. I am fed. At
Gods
Ms. Sexton went out looking for the gods. She began looking in the sky -expecting a large white angel with a blue crotch. No one. She looked next in all the learned books And
The Errand
I’ve been going right on, page by page, Since we last kissed, two long dolls in a cage, Two hunger-mongers throwing a myth in and out, Double-crossing out lives with doubt, Leaving us separate
Admonitions To A Special Person
Watch out for power, For its avalanche can bury you, Snow, snow, snow, smothering your mountain. Watch out for hate, It can open its mouth and you’ll fling yourself out To eat off your
The Double Image
1. I am thirty this November. You are still small, in your fourth year. We stand watching the yellow leaves go queer, Flapping in the winter rain. Falling flat and washed. And I remember
Cripples And Other Stories
My doctor, the comedian I called you every time And made you laugh yourself When I wrote this silly rhyme… Each time I give lectures or gather in the grants you send me off
Small Wire
My faith Is a great weight Hung on a small wire, As doth the spider Hang her baby on a thin web, As doth the vine, Twiggy and wooden, Hold up grapes Like eyeballs,
The Children
The children are all crying in their pens And the surf carries their cries away. They are old men who have seen too much, Their mouths are full of dirty clothes, The tongues poverty,
The Starry Night
That does not keep me from having a terrible need of shall I say the word religion. Then I go out at night to paint the stars. Vincent Van Gogh in a letter to