Now

Related poetry:

1. Not Mine All my life to pretend this world of theirs is mine And to know such pretending is disgraceful. But what can I do? Suppose I suddenly screamed And started to prophesy. No one would hear me. Their screens and microphones are not for that. Others like me wander the streets And talk to themselves. Sleep […]...
2. New Mexico I was fairly drunk when it Began and I took out my bottle and used it Along the way. I was reading a week or two after Kandel and I did not look quite as Pretty but I brought it off and we Ended up at the Webbs, 6, 8, 10 of Us, and I […]...
3. A Theory Of Prosody When Nellie, my old pussy Cat, was still in her prime, She would sit behind me As I wrote, and when the line Got too long she’d reach One sudden black foreleg down And paw at the moving hand, The offensive one. The first Time she drew blood I learned It was poetic to end […]...
4. How Is Your Heart? during my worst times on the park benches in the jails or living with whores I always had this certain contentment- I wouldn’t call it happiness- it was more of an inner balance that settled for whatever was occuring and it helped in the factories and when relationships went wrong with the girls. it helped […]...
5. Are You Drinking? washed-up, on shore, the old yellow notebook out again I write from the bed as I did last year. will see the doctor, Monday. “yes, doctor, weak legs, vertigo, head- aches and my back hurts.” “are you drinking?” he will ask. “are you getting your Exercise, your vitamins?” I think that I am just ill […]...
6. Villa Pauline But, ah! before he came You were only a name: Four little rooms and a cupboard Without a bone, And I was alone! Now with your windows wide Everything from outside Of sun and flower and loveliness Comes in to hide, To play, to laugh on the stairs, To catch unawares Our childish happiness, And […]...
7. Young In New Orleans starving there, sitting around the bars, And at night walking the streets for hours, The moonlight always seemed fake To me, mabye it was, And in the French Quarter I watched The horses and buggies going by, Everybody sitting high in the open Carriages, the black driver, and in Back the man and the woman, […]...
8. The Red Dance There was a girl Who danced in the city that night, That April 22nd, All along the Charles River. It was as if one hundred men were watching Or do I mean the one hundred eyes of God? The yellow patches in the sycamores Glowed like miniature flashlights. The shadows, the skin of them Were […]...
9. Strayed Crab This is not my home. How did I get so far from water? It must Be over that way somewhere. I am the color of wine, of tinta. The inside of my powerful Right claw is saffron-yellow. See, I see it now; I wave it like a Flag. I am dapper and elegant; I move […]...
10. Manufactured Gods THEY put up big wooden gods. Then they burned the big wooden gods And put up brass gods and Changing their minds suddenly Knocked down the brass gods and put up A doughface god with gold earrings. The poor mutts, the pathetic slant heads, They didn’t know a little tin god Is as good as […]...
11. 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 print spat back at her. No one She made a pilgrimage to the great poet And he belched in her […]...
12. "Shouting" for a Camel It was over at Coolgardie that a mining speculator, Who was going down the township just to make a bit o’ chink, Went off to hire a camel from a camel propagator, And the Afghan said he’d lend it if he’d stand the beast a drink. Yes, the only price he asked him was to […]...
13. Films I HAVE kept all, not one is thrown away, not one given to the ragman, not one thrust in a corner with a “P-f-f.” The red ones and the blue, the long ones in stripes, and each of the little black and white checkered ones. Keep them: I tell my heart: keep them another year, […]...
14. Stylised tulips stylised tulips – this is what the card says And they have that nineteen-twenties’ feel Of those bright young things a decade before us Who had a way of walking with their legs Bent back and their pelvis forward as if Inviting a kind of sexual depravity With the no touch signs fervently displayed Stylised […]...
15. The Learner I’ve learned Of all the friends I’ve won Dame Nature is the best, And to her like a child I run Craving her mother breast To comfort me in soul distress, And in green glade to find Far from the world’s unloveliness Pure peace of mind. I’ve learned the worth of simple ways, And though […]...
16. It was given to me by the Gods It was given to me by the Gods When I was a little Girl They given us Presents most you know When we are new and small. I kept it in my Hand I never put it down I did not dare to eat or sleep For fear it would be gone I heard such […]...
17. My Bed is Covered Yellow My bed is covered yellow – Oh Sun, I sit on you Oh golden field I lay on you Oh money I dream of you More, More, cried the bed – talk to me more – Oh bed that taked the weight of the world – all the lost dreams laid on you Oh bed […]...
18. First Party At Ken Kesey's With Hell's Angels Cool black night thru redwoods Cars parked outside in shade Behind the gate, stars dim above The ravine, a fire burning by the side Porch and a few tired souls hunched over In black leather jackets. In the huge Wooden house, a yellow chandelier At 3 A. M. the blast of loudspeakers Hi-fi Rolling Stones […]...
19. Lines Draw a line. Write a line. There. Stay in line, hold the line, a glance Between the lines is fine but don’t Turn corners, cross, cut in, go over Or out, between two points of no Return’s a line of flight, between Two points of view’s a line of vision. But a line of thought […]...
20. Repetitions THEY are crying salt tears Over the beautiful beloved body Of Inez Milholland, Because they are glad she lived, Because she loved open-armed, Throwing love for a cheap thing Belonging to everybody- Cheap as sunlight, And morning air....
21. Jack's Legacy The critic gushed and said, “Just like Jack, So raw, I never thought to see another writer just Like Kerouac!” Kerouac, who the fuck is he? A writer? Christ, that’s a laugh, compare me to a writer! Let’s face it I’m no hack, I’m not so much to look at either, But maybe Jack took […]...
22. The Blind And The Dead She lay like a saint on her copper couch; Like an angel asleep she lay, In the stare of the ghoulish folks that slouch Past the Dead and sneak away. Then came old Jules of the sightless gaze, Who begged in the streets for bread. Each day he had come for a year of days, […]...
23. Externalism The Greatest Writer of to-day (With Maupassant I almost set him) Said to me in a weary way, The last occasion that I met him: “Old chap, this world is more and more Becoming bourgeois, blasé, blousy: Thank God I’ve lived so long before It got so definitely lousy.” Said I: “Old chap, I don’t […]...
24. Three Oranges first time my father overheard me listening to This bit of music he asked me, “what is it?” “it’s called Love For Three Oranges,” I informed him. “boy,” he said, “that’s getting it Cheap.” He meant sex. Listening to it I always imagined three oranges Sitting there, You know how orange they can Get, So […]...
25. Six Significant Landscapes I An old man sits In the shadow of a pine tree In China. He sees larkspur, Blue and white, At the edge of the shadow, Move in the wind. His beard moves in the wind. The pine tree moves in the wind. Thus water flows Over weeds. II The night is of the colour […]...
26. Since Nine O'Clock Half past twelve. Time has gone by quickly Since nine o’clock when I lit the lamp And sat down here. I’ve been sitting without reading, Without speaking. Completely alone in the house, Whom could I talk to? Since nine o’clock when I lit the lamp The shade of my young body Has come to haunt […]...
27. Taken from men this morning Taken from men this morning Carried by men today Met by the Gods with banners Who marshalled her away One little maid from playmates One little mind from school There must be guests in Eden All the rooms are full Far as the East from Even Dim as the border star Courtiers quaint, in Kingdoms […]...
28. The Furies Not a third that walks beside me, But five or six or more. Whether at dusk or daybreak Or at blinding noon, a retinue Of shadows that no door Excludes. One like a kind of scrawl, Hands scrawled trembling and blue, A harelipped and hunchbacked dwarf With a smile like a grapefruit rind, Who jabbers […]...
29. Lines from I’d rather have my verses win A place in common people’s hearts, Who, toiling through the strife and din Of life’s great thoroughfares, and marts, May read some line my hand has penned; Some simple verse, not fine, or grand, But what their hearts can understand And hold me henceforth as a friend, I’d rather […]...
30. Forth went the candid man Forth went the candid man And spoke freely to the wind When he looked about him he was in a far strange country. Forth went the candid man And spoke freely to the stars Yellow light tore sight from his eyes. “My good fool,” said a learned bystander, “Your operations are mad.” “You are too […]...
31. Lesson 1 At least I’ve learned this much: Life doesn’t have to be All poetry and roses. Life Can be bus rides, gritty sidewalks, Electric bills, dishwashing, Chapped lips, dull stubby pencils With the erasers chewed off, Cheap radios played too loud, The rank smell of stale coffee Yet still glow With the inner fire of an […]...
32. This Then it’s the same as before Or the other time Or the time before that. Here’s a cock And here’s a cunt And here’s trouble. Only each time You think Well now I’ve learned: I’ll let her do that And I’ll do this, I no longer want it all, Just some comfort And some sex And […]...
33. Evarra And His Gods Read here: This is the story of Evarra man Maker of Gods in lands beyond the sea. Because the city gave him of her gold, Because the caravans brought turquoises, Because his life was sheltered by the King, So that no man should maim him, none should steal, Or break his rest with babble in […]...
34. Not Dead Walking through trees to cool my heat and pain, I know that David’s with me here again. All that is simple, happy, strong, he is. Caressingly I stroke Rough bark of the friendly oak. A brook goes bubbling by: the voice is his. Turf burns with pleasant smoke; I laugh at chaffinch and at primroses. […]...
35. The Owners Of The Little Box Line the inside of the little box With your precious skin And make yourself cozy Just as you would in your own home Make space voyages inside her Gather stars make time squirt its milk And sleep in the clouds Just don’t go around pretending You’re more important than her length And wiser than her […]...
36. The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse A persona che mai tornasse al mondo, Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse. Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero, Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo. Let us go then, you and I, When the evening is spread out against the sky Like a […]...
37. As You Leave Me Shiny record albums scattered over The living room floor, reflecting light From the lamp, sharp reflections that hurt My eyes as I watch you, squatting among the platters, The beer foam making mustaches on your lips. And, too, The shadows on your cheeks from your long lashes Fascinate me almost as much as the dimples […]...
38. A Brief History of Gods First, we worshipped the inanimate. Next, we learned to worship the gods Later, we discovered the Deity. Then, dazzled by our own Reason We returned to the inanimate And ended up worshipping anything, From football to economic growth....
39. The Round Light splashed this morning On the shell-pink anemones Swaying on their tall stems; Down blue-spiked veronica Light flowed in rivulets Over the humps of the honeybees; This morning I saw light kiss The silk of the roses In their second flowering, My late bloomers Flushed with their brandy. A curious gladness shook me. So I […]...
40. Illustrious Ancestors The Rav Of Northern White Russia declined, In his youth, to learn the Language of birds, because The extraneous did not interest him; nevertheless When he grew old it was found He understood them anyway, having Listened well, and as it is said, ‘prayed With the bench and the floor.’ He used What was at […]...