You've given me a weapon

Related poetry:

1. The Other Tiger A tiger comes to mind. The twilight here Exalts the vast and busy Library And seems to set the bookshelves back in gloom; Innocent, ruthless, bloodstained, sleek It wanders through its forest and its day Printing a track along the muddy banks Of sluggish streams whose names it does not know (In its world there […]...
2. A SIMPLE POEM I want you to continue writing Because I will not always be around With lips that will never touch mine Read your poems out loud So that the words are left engraved On the wall Make me feel your voice rush through me Like a breeze from Oyá I want to hear about Puerto Rico […]...
3. To Make A Dadist Poem Take a newspaper. Take some scissors. Choose from this paper an article the length you want to make your poem. Cut out the article. Next carefully cut out each of the words that make up this article and put them all in a bag. Shake gently. Next take out each cutting one after the other. […]...
4. The Morning Walk When Anne and I go out a walk, We hold each other’s hand and talk Of all the things we mean to do When Anne and I are forty-two. And when we’ve thought about a thing, Like bowling hoops or bicycling, Or falling down on Anne’s balloon, We do it in the afternoon....
5. Glass Words of a poem should be glass But glass so simple-subtle its shape Is nothing but the shape of what it holds. A glass spun for itself is empty, Brittle, at best Venetian trinket. Embossed glass hides the poem of its absence. Words should be looked through, should be windows. The best word were invisible. […]...
6. Inspiration How often have I started out With no thought in my noodle, And wandered here and there about, Where fancy bade me toddle; Till feeling faunlike in my glee I’ve voiced some gay distiches, Returning joyfully to tea, A poem in my britches. A-squatting on a thymy slope With vast of sky about me, I’ve […]...
7. Distress Coils Poem by Anne-Marie Derése, translated by Judith Skillman. The waiting volcano inside us Gnaws, digs, trembles, Weighs its chances. Distress coils up, Shrinks silent like a sick beast. We are unrecognizable, Unique In the certainty of our ferocity....
8. Tu m'as donnè une arme Poem by Anne-Marie Derése. Tu m’as donnè une arme Dans le troupeau humain, Tu as lancè tes mots Commes des pierres. Les blessures furent Bonnes lècher. Tu as rèveillè le feulement. Tu t’es donnè comme on prend....
9. Forgive Me Poem by Anne-Marie Derése, translated by Judith Skillman. Forgive me if I have laughed In your chapels, Forgive me if I have slammed The hospital door, Forgive me for the noise, For life, For the love to which I have no right. Forgive me for not resembling you....
10. Temporary Poem Of My Time Hebrew writing and Arabic writing go from east to west, Latin writing, from west to east. Languages are like cats: You must not stroke their hair the wrong way. The clouds come from the sea, the hot wind from the desert, The trees bend in the wind, And stones fly from all four winds, Into […]...
11. Notice What This Poem Is Not Doing The light along the hills in the morning Comes down slowly, naming the trees White, then coasting the ground for stones to nominate. Notice what this poem is not doing. A house, a house, a barn, the old Quarry, where the river shrugs How much of this place is yours? Notice what this poem is […]...
12. Saddest Poem I can write the saddest poem of all tonight. Write, for instance: “The night is full of stars, And the stars, blue, shiver in the distance.” The night wind whirls in the sky and sings. I can write the saddest poem of all tonight. I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too. On nights […]...
13. I Am Poem by Anne-Marie Derése, translated by Judith Skillman. I am the red brand On the shoulder of the condemned, The gallows and the rope, The ax and the block, The whip and the cross. I am the lion’s tooth In the flesh of the gazelle. In my veins I have The blood of the slave […]...
14. Face Stolen From a Bird Poem by Anne-Marie Derése, translated by Judith Skillman. I don’t know who you’re hiding Behind your mask, Your face stolen from a bird, Imprisoned by red ashes. I will love you the way one dies. I will keep you For years to come, You will be so tame, So unbelievable, My strange animal, With your […]...
15. La dètresse s'enroule Poem by Anne-Marie Derése. Le volcan en attente au fond de nous Ronge, creuse, tremble, Soupése ses chances. La dètresse s’enroule, Se tasse comme une bНte malade. Nous sommes mèconnaissables, Uniques, Avec la certitude de notre fèrocitè....
16. Pardon Poem by Anne-Marie Derése. Pardon si j’ai ri Dans vos chapelles, Pardon si j’ai claquè La porte de l’hЩpital, Pardon pour le bruit, Pour la vie, Pour l’amour auquel Je n’avais pas droit. Pardon de ne pas vous ressembler....
17. The Drunkard from St. Ambrose He fears the tiger standing in his way. The tiger takes its time, it smiles and growls. Like moons, the two blank eyes tug at his bowels. “God help me now,” is all that he can say. “God help me now, how close I’ve come to God. To love and to be […]...
18. Sestina for Jim Cummins In Iowa, Jim dreamed that Della Street was Anne Sexton’s Twin. Dave drew a comic strip called the “Adventures of Whitman,” About a bearded beer-guzzler in Superman uniform. Donna dressed like Wallace Stevens In a seersucker summer suit. To town came Ted Berrigan, Saying, “My idea of a bad poet is Marvin […]...
19. Je Suis Poem by Anne-Marie Derése Je suis le fer rouge Sur l’èpaule du condamnè, Le gibet et la corde, La hache et le billot, Le fouet et la croix. Je suis la dent du lion Dans la chair de la gazelle. J’ai dans mes veines Le sang de nègriers. Bourreau, J’ai mèritè la faim des loups. […]...
20. The New Poetry Handbook 1 If a man understands a poem, he shall have troubles. 2 If a man lives with a poem, he shall die lonely. 3 If a man lives with two poems, he shall be unfaithful to one. 4 If a man conceives of a poem, he shall have one less child. 5 If a man […]...
21. Dead Cow Farm An ancient saga tells us how In the beginning the First Cow (For nothing living yet had birth But Elemental Cow on earth) Began to lick cold stones and mud: Under her warm tongue flesh and blood Blossomed, a miracle to believe: And so was Adam born, and Eve. Here now is chaos once again, […]...
22. The good soldier on someone else’s place It seems to him the land Slings distance way out The dirt is dead and The sky seems twisted The beat of the stones is wrong He doesn’t know how to say it There are no words no opportunity And anyway What would you say That you’re a stranger And this […]...
23. Visage volè l'oiseau Poem by Anne-Marie Derése Je ne sais qui tu caches Sous ton visage inventè, Ton visage volè l’oiseau, Emprisonnè de cendre rouge. Je vais t’aimer comme on meurt. Je vais te garder Pour les annèes venir. Tu seras si apprivoisè, Si incroyable, Mon ètrange animal, Avec tes lévres ouverte Sur un sourire perdu. Je boirai […]...
24. Doughnut denial (an ascetic poem for karen’s birthday) Fancy having a birthday on a thursday When you do the buying of the doughnuts And others lick their sticky fingers Thinking good old karen letting Us share the eating of her birthday Not me of course – i sit at home (alone) Reflecting it is purification day Today […]...
25. The Lion and the Lamb I saw a Tiger’s golden flank, I saw what food he ate, By a desert spring he drank; The Tiger’s name was Hate. Then I saw a placid Lamb Lying fast asleep; Like a river from its dam Flashed the Tiger’s leap. I saw a lion tawny-red, Terrible and brave; The Tiger’s leap overhead Broke […]...
26. Night Opens to the Storm Poem by Anne-Marie Derése, translated by Judith Skillman. Night opens to the storm, A mauve coupling, Swollen. The sky, laden Like a merchant ship, Throws off its anchor. Danger, heavier Each instant, Exudes the mugginess Of a greenhouse. Shimmering like mercury The Valley of the Seven Muses Breathes mist Through its gray nostrils. The valley […]...
27. Introduction To Poetry I ask them to take a poem And hold it up to the light Like a color slide Or press an ear against its hive. I say drop a mouse into a poem And watch him probe his way out, Or walk inside the poem’s room And feel the walls for a light switch. I […]...
28. MY PERFECT ROSE At ten she came to me, three years ago, There was ‘something between us’ even then; Watching her write like Eliot every day, Turn prose into haiku in ten minutes flat, Write a poem in Greek three weeks from learning the alphabet; Then translate it as ‘Sun on a tomb, gold place, small sacred horse’. […]...
29. La nuit s'ouvre, l'orage Poem by Anne-Marie Derése La nuit s’ouvre, l’orage, Accouplement mauve, Boursouflure. Le ciel chargè Comme un bateau marchand Jette l’ancre. Le danger plus lourd Chaque instant Distille une moiteur De serre. Miroitante de mercure, La vallèe des sept Meuses Souffle la brume Par ses narines grises. La vallèe a rejoint la nuit, Deux femelles humides […]...
30. Poetry And Religion Religions are poems. They concert Our daylight and dreaming mind, our Emotions, instinct, breath and native gesture Into the only whole thinking: poetry. Nothing’s said till it’s dreamed out in words And nothing’s true that figures in words only. A poem, compared with an arrayed religion, May be like a soldier’s one short marriage night […]...
31. Psalm Three On the day when my words Were earth… I was a friend to stalks of wheat. On the day when my words Were wrath I was a friend to chains. On the day when my words Were stones I was a friend to streams. On the day when my words Were a rebellion I was […]...
32. Poem This poem is not addressed to you. You may come into it briefly, But no one will find you here, no one. You will have changed before the poem will. Even while you sit there, unmovable, You have begun to vanish. And it does no matter. The poem will go on without you. It has […]...
33. The Correspondence School Instructor Says Goodbye To His Poetry Students Goodbye, lady in Bangor, who sent me Snapshots of yourself, after definitely hinting You were beautiful; goodbye, Miami Beach urologist, who enclosed plain Brown envelopes for the return of your very Clinical Sonnet; goodbye, manufacturer Of brassieres on the Coast, whose eclogues Give the fullest treatment in literature yet To the sagging-breast motif; goodbye, you […]...
34. Prologue 1/ The taste of a poem Is in the relishing Sweet, sour or bitter Cold, lukewarm or hot The test of a poem Is in the nourishing Undying, fleeting or naught Its effect in the heart 2/ Here are the lines That got stuck in the jam On their way to your heart Possibly the […]...
35. The Tiger The tiger, on the other hand, Is kittenish and mild, And makes a pretty playfellow For any little child. And mothers of large families (Who claim to common sense) Will find a tiger well repays The trouble and expense....
36. Cacoethes Scribendi If all the trees in all the woods were men; And each and every blade of grass a pen; If every leaf on every shrub and tree Turned to a sheet of foolscap; every sea Were changed to ink, and all earth’s living tribes Had nothing else to do but act as scribes, And for […]...
37. "I Love You Sweatheart&quot A man risked his life to write the words. A man hung upside down (an idiot friend Holding his legs?) with spray paint To write the words on a girder fifty feet above A highway. And his beloved, The next morning driving to work…? His words are not (meant to be) so unique. Does she […]...
38. My Cross I wrote a poem to the moon But no one noticed it; Although I hoped that late or soon Someone would praise a bit Its purity and grace forlone, Its beauty tulip-cool… But as my poem died still-born, I felt a fool. I wrote a verse of vulgar trend Spiced with an oath or two; […]...
39. Cuchulain Comforted A man that had six mortal wounds, a man Violent and famous, strode among the dead; Eyes stared out of the branches and were gone. Then certain Shrouds that muttered head to head Came and were gone. He leant upon a tree As though to meditate on wounds and blood. A Shroud that seemed to […]...
40. Ars Poetica A poem should be palpable and mute As a globed fruit, Dumb As old medallions to the thumb, Silent as the sleeve-worn stone Of casement ledges where the moss has grown A poem should be wordless As the flight of birds. * A poem should be motionless in time As the moon climbs, Leaving, as […]...