So Much I Gazed

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1. Picture Of A 23-Year-Old Youth Painted By His Friend Of The Same Age, An Amature He finished the painting yesterday noon. Now He studies it in detail. He has painted him in a Gray unbuttoned coat, a deep gray; without Any vest or any tie. With a rose-colored shirt; Open at the collar, so something might be seen Also of the beauty of his chest, of his neck. The right […]...
2. Poseidonians The Poseidonians forgot the Greek language After so many centuries of mingling With Tyrrhenians, Latins, and other foreigners. The only thing surviving from their ancestors Was a Greek festival, with beautiful rites, With lyres and flutes, contests and wreaths. And it was their habit toward the festival’s end To tell each other about their ancient […]...
3. July 12 Wisteria, hysteria is as obvious a rhyme As Viagra and Niagara there must be a reason Honeymooners traditionally went to the Falls Which were, said the divine Oscar, An American bride’s second biggest disappointment Tell me which do you like better, The American Falls or the Horseshoe Falls, I say the Horseshoe Falls, Joe says, […]...
4. One Of Their Gods When one of them passed through the market place Of Seleucia, toward the hour that night falls As a tall and perfectly handsome youth, With the joy of immortality in his eyes, With his scented black hair, The passers-by would stare at him And one would ask the other if he knew him, And if […]...
5. A HOPE FOR POETRY: REMEMBERING THE SIXTIES There was a hope for poetry in the sixties And for education and society, teachers free To do as they wanted: I could and did teach Poetry and art all day and little else – That was my way. I threw rainbows against the classroom walls, Gold and silver dragons in the corridors and Halls; […]...
6. Dogfish Some kind of relaxed and beautiful thing Kept flickering in with the tide And looking around. Black as a fisherman’s boot, With a white belly. If you asked for a picture I would have to draw a smile Under the perfectly round eyes and above the chin, Which was rough As a thousand sharpened nails. […]...
7. Ordinary Love Indescribable our love and still we say With eyes averted, turning out the light, “I love you,” in the ordinary way And tug the coverlet where once we lay, All suntanned limbs entangled, shivering, white… Indescribably in love. Or so we say. Your hair’s blonde thicket now is tangle-gray; You turn your back; you murmur […]...
8. The Unequal Fetters Cou’d we stop the time that’s flying Or recall itt when ’tis past Put far off the day of Dying Or make Youth for ever last To Love wou’d then be worth our cost. But since we must loose those Graces Which at first your hearts have wonne And you seek for in new Faces […]...
9. The Dance She is young. Have I the right Even to name her? Child, It is not love I offer Your quick limbs, your eyes; Only the barren homage Of an old man whom time Crucifies. Take my hand A moment in the dance, Ignoring its sly pressure, The dry rut of age, And lead me under […]...
10. Nero's Term Nero was not worried when he heard The prophecy of the Delphic Oracle. “Let him fear the seventy three years.” He still had ample time to enjoy himself. He is thirty. More than sufficient Is the term the god allots him To prepare for future perils. Now he will return to Rome slightly tired, But […]...
11. On Faith How do people stay true to each other? When I think of my parents all those years In the unmade bed of their marriage, not ever Longing for anything else – or: no, they must Have longed; there must have been flickerings, Stray desires, nights she turned from him, Sleepless, and wept, nights he rose […]...
12. The House Of Dust: Part 03: 01: As evening falls As evening falls, And the yellow lights leap one by one Along high walls; And along black streets that glisten as if with rain, The muted city seems Like one in a restless sleep, who lies and dreams Of vague desires, and memories, and half-forgotten pain. . . Along dark veins, like lights the quick […]...
13. The Self and the Mulberry I wanted to see the self, so I looked at the mulberry. It had no trouble accepting its limits, Yet defining and redefining a small area So that any shape was possible, any movement. It stayed put, but was part of all the air. I wanted to learn to be there and not there Like […]...
14. Incantation Human reason is beautiful and invincible. No bars, no barbed wire, no pulping of books, No sentence of banishment can prevail against it. It establishes the universal ideas in language, And guides our hand so we write Truth and Justice With capital letters, lie and oppression with small. It puts what should be above things […]...
15. Sonnet V: Nothing But No Nothing but “No,” and “Aye,” and “Aye,” and “No”? How falls it out so strangely you reply? I tell ye, Fair, I’ll not be answer’d so, With this affirming “No,” denying “Aye.” I say, “I love,” you slightly answer “Aye”; I say, “You love,” you pule me out a “No”; I say, “I die,” you […]...
16. You Are Old, Father William “You are old, Father william,” the young man said, “And your hair has become very white; And yet you incessantly stand on your head Do you think, at your age, it is right? “In my youth,” Father William replied to his son, “I feared it might injure the brain; But now that I’m perfectly sure […]...
17. The Retreat this time has finished me. I feel like the German troops Whipped by snow and the communists Walking bent With newspapers stuffed into Worn boots. My plight is just as terrible. Maybe more so. Victory was so close Victory was there. As she stood before my mirror Younger and more beautiful than Any woman I […]...
18. Understanding The years of my youth, my sensual life How clearly I see their meaning now. What needless repentances, how futile…. But I did not understand the meaning then. In the dissolute life of my youth The desires of my poetry were being formed, The scope of my art was being plotted. This is why my […]...
19. Loch Ness Beautiful Loch Ness, The truth to express, Your landscapes are lovely and gay, Along each side of your waters, to Fort Augustus all the way, Your scenery is romantic… With rocks and hills gigantic… Enough to make one frantic, As they view thy beautiful heathery hills, And their clear crystal rills, And the beautiful woodlands […]...
20. Selecting A Reader First, I would have her be beautiful, And walking carefully up on my poetry At the loneliest moment of an afternoon, Her hair still damp at the neck From washing it. She should be wearing A raincoat, an old one, dirty From not having money enough for the cleaners. She will take out her glasses, […]...
21. Don Juan Under the lips and limbs, the embraces, faces, Under the sharp circumference, the brightness, Under the fence of shadows, Is something I am seeking; Under the faces a face, Under the new an old or a not-yet-come-to; Under the voices a peace. Am I a darkness all your flames must light? A mirror all your […]...
22. The New Mistress “Oh, sick I am to see you, will you never let me be? You may be good for something, but you are not good for me. Oh, go where you are wanted, for you are not wanted here. And that was all the farewell when I parted from my dear. “I will go where I […]...
23. Frederick Douglass When it is finally ours, this freedom, this liberty, this beautiful And terrible thing, needful to man as air, Usable as earth; when it belongs at last to all, When it is truly instinct, brain matter, diastole, systole, Reflex action; when it is finally won; when it is more Than the gaudy mumbo jumbo of […]...
24. The Well At sixteen I believed the moonlight Could change me if it would. I moved my head On the pillow, even moved my bed As the moon slowly Crossed the open lattice. I wanted beauty, a dangerous Gleam of steel, my body thinner, My pale face paler. I moonbathed Diligently, as others sunbathe. But the moon’s […]...
25. Who is now Reading This? WHO is now reading this? May-be one is now reading this who knows some wrong-doing of my past life, Or may-be a stranger is reading this who has secretly loved me, Or may-be one who meets all my grand assumptions and egotisms with derision, Or may-be one who is puzzled at me. As if I […]...
26. Under the Harvest Moon Under the harvest moon, When the soft silver Drips shimmering Over the garden nights, Death, the gray mocker, Comes and whispers to you As a beautiful friend Who remembers. Under the summer roses When the flagrant crimson Lurks in the dusk Of the wild red leaves, Love, with little hands, Comes and touches you With […]...
27. Pods PEA pods cling to stems. Neponset, the village, Clings to the Burlington railway main line. Terrible midnight limiteds roar through Hauling sleepers to the Rockies and Sierras. The earth is slightly shaken And Neponset trembles slightly in its sleep....
28. Crazy Jane Grown Old Looks At The Dancers I found that ivory image there Dancing with her chosen youth, But when he wound her coal-black hair As though to strangle her, no scream Or bodily movement did I dare, Eyes under eyelids did so gleam; Love is like the lion’s tooth. When She, and though some said she played I said that she […]...
29. May Miracle On this festive first of May, Wending wistfully my way Three sad sights I saw today. The first was such a lovely lad He lit with grace the sordid street; Yet in a monk’s robe he was clad, With tonsured head and sandalled feet. Though handsome as a movie star His eyes had holiness in […]...
30. Indian Dancer EYES ravished with rapture, celestially panting, what passionate bosoms aflaming with fire Drink deep of the hush of the hyacinth heavens that glimmer around them in fountains of light; O wild and entrancing the strain of keen music that cleaveth the stars like a wail of desire, And beautiful dancers with houri-like faces bewitch the […]...
31. On An Italian Shore Kimos, son of Menedoros, a young Greek-Italian, Devotes his life to amusing himself, Like most young men in Greater Greece Brought up in the lap of luxury. But today, in spite of his nature, He is preoccupied, dejected. Near the shore He watched, deeply distressed, as they unload Ships with booty taken from the Peloponnese. […]...
32. Drunken Memories Of Anne Sexton The first and last time I met My ex-lover Anne Sexton was at A protest poetry reading against Some anti-constitutional war in Asia When some academic son of a bitch, To test her reputation as a drunk, Gave her a beer glass full of wine After our reading. She drank It all down while staring […]...
33. Adam's Curse We sat together at one summer’s end, That beautiful mild woman, your close friend, And you and I, and talked of poetry. I said, ‘A line will take us hours maybe; Yet if it does not seem a moment’s thought, Our stitching and unstitching has been naught. Better go down upon your marrow-bones And scrub […]...
34. Poem For People That Are Understandably Too Busy To Read Poetry Relax. This won’t last long. Or if it does, or if the lines Make you sleepy or bored, Give in to sleep, turn on The T. V., deal the cards. This poem is built to withstand Such things. Its feelings Cannot be hurt. They exist Somewhere in the poet, And I am far away. Pick […]...
35. In Trouble 1 It’s all for nothing: I’ve lost im now. 2 I suppose it ad to be: 3 But oh I never thought it of im, 4 Nor e never thought it of me. 5 And all for a kiss on your evening out 6 An a field where the grass was down… 7 And e […]...
36. RUN AND WON When you entered the workshop, I was already here. How many statues, and torsos, and heads! Like remains of the battle that never ends. I am giggling into my beard. Wind’s fluffy plume Is struggling with the curtain. I know you can hear Both, not becoming distinct, no matter for whom. I wanted something glamorous, […]...
37. Excerpts from "Poetry&quot Poetry, I found you Where at last they chained and bound you; With devices all around you To torture and confound you, I found you-shivering, bare. They had shorn your raven hair And taken both your eyes Which, once cerulean as the skies, Had leapt at dawn to wild surmise Of what was waiting there. […]...
38. Florentine Pilgrim “I’ll do the old dump in a day,” He told me in his brittle way. “Two more, I guess, I’ll give to Rome Before I hit the trail for home; But while I’m there I kindo’ hope To have an audience with the Pope.” We stood upon the terraced height With sunny Florence in our […]...
39. The Poet The riches of the poet are equal to his poetry His power is his left hand It is idle weak and precious His poverty is his wealth, a wealth which may destroy him like Midas Because it is that laziness which is a form of impatience And this he may be destroyed by the gold […]...
40. The Irish Convict's Return Ye mountains and glens of Old Ireland, I’ve returned home to ye again; During my absence from ye My heart always felt great pain. Oh, how I long’d to see you dear Nora, And the old folks at home; And the beautiful Lakes o’ Killarney, Where we oft together did roam. Ye beautiful Lakes of […]...