Favourite Pomes

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Passing
By Staceyann Chin

Downtown Brooklyn is easy for me
long sheer skirts do little to hide my open legged stride
see-through button-down sleeveless blouses hug my bodice
so tight my nipples are barely concealed
by the carefully chosen push-up bra from Macy's

see, I'm a femme
a real lipstick lesbian
so I can pass—
smelling like a straight girl in my Victoria's Secret
satin panties pressing against the men who walk alongside me
passing—the way my yellow-skinned grandmother passed
as white women sat in judgment

on plantation stools overlooking fields
of cotton and sugarcane sweetened by gallons
of Black blood and sweat running down thick
between the full breasts of the women
who lay still as blue-eyed men pierced their hearts deep
through the folds joining their legs

it's Jay Street-Borough Hall
and my friend is in trouble
someone takes the time to notice
that the young boy is really a young girl
and the red, white, and blue jacket is not enough
to cover the tattoo on her belly
two naked women wrapped around each other
like pretzels that came out different from the rest

it takes two minutes for them to break two ribs
              one for her lover who passes all the time
              the other she keeps for herself
              and as those bones set
her sorrow breaks wide open
because she knows SHE can never pass
she knows that butch bodies are too strong
too strange, too dark
like those bronze bodies that smell
too thickly of rebellions and revolutions
                            and we know that revolutions take time
and sacrifice and lives to turn this world around

sometimes it makes me angry
that they think I look like them
so they can convince themselves I am okay
but I hasten to show them the tangled wool between my thighs

and I am quick to remind them
that the funk from me only rises
when my woman touches me
that I can only come
when she calls my name

we need to let them know
we do not wish to pass as semi-white
or almost straight
or nearly normal
so we can hold down corporate jobs
stroking narrow-minded dicks
so we can be invited to family dinners
to disown our brothers and sisters who cannot pass
who will not pass

we must let them know
that after the broken bones have healed
that we will still be here
that long after the bruised hearts have ceased to hurt
we will still be here and long,
long after our mothers no longer weep
we will still be here
still gay
still Black
still survivors in the face of this blatant bigotry
that will one day force us to lace arms and strike back

[Tift]

(Philip Larkin 1922-85 .. this is  a product of it's time
it can't be universal as I know of many exceptions
but it also rings true for many… I just love it's wry humour)

This Be The Verse
By Philip Larkin

They fuck you up, your mum and dad. 
    They may not mean to, but they do. 
They fill you with the faults they had
    And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
    By fools in old-style hats and coats, 
Who half the time were soppy-stern
    And half at one another’s throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
    It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
    And don’t have any kids yourself.

[Tift]

A Russian speaking philosopher wrote of Ivan Turgenev
“by temperament Turgenev was not politically minded. 
Nature, personal relationships, quality of feeling –
these are what he understood best, these, and their
expression in art.  He loved every manifestation of art
and beauty as deeply as anyone has ever done.”

I agree but I am biased having read his poetry and a
few novels. 

The Sparrow
Ivan Turgenev

I was returning from hunting, and walking along an avenue of the garden, my
dog running in front of me.

Suddenly he took shorter steps, and began to steal along as though tracking
game.

I looked along the avenue, and saw a young sparrow, with yellow about its
beak and down on its head. It had fallen out of the nest (the wind was
violently shaking the birch-trees in the avenue) and sat unable to move,
helplessly flapping its half-grown wings.

My dog was slowly approaching it, when, suddenly darting down from a tree
close by, an old dark-throated sparrow fell like a stone right before his
nose, and all ruffled up, terrified, with despairing and pitiful cheeps, it
flung itself twice towards the open jaws of shining teeth.

It sprang to save; it cast itself before its nestling … but all its tiny
body was shaking with terror; its note was harsh and strange. Swooning with
fear, it offered itself up!

What a huge monster must the dog have seemed to it! And yet it could not
stay on its high branch out of danger…. A force stronger than its will
flung it down.

My Trésor stood still, drew back…. Clearly he too recognised this force.

I hastened to call off the disconcerted dog, and went away, full of
reverence.

Yes; do not laugh. I felt reverence for that tiny heroic bird, for its
impulse of love.

Love, I thought, is stronger than death or the fear of death. Only by it,
by love, life holds together and advances.

[Tift]

Please forgive a second poem by Turgenev.
This person thinks highly of it and so takes
a liberty and posts it.

The Fool
Ivan Turgenev

There lived a fool.

For a long time he lived in peace and contentment; but by degrees rumours
began to reach him that he was regarded on all sides as a vulgar idiot.

The fool was abashed and began to ponder gloomily how he might put an end
to these unpleasant rumours.

A sudden idea, at last, illuminated his dull little brain…. And, without
the slightest delay, he put it into practice.

A friend met him in the street, and fell to praising a well-known
painter….

'Upon my word!' cried the fool,' that painter was out of date long ago …
you didn't know it? I should never have expected it of you … you are
quite behind the times.'

The friend was alarmed, and promptly agreed with the fool.

'Such a splendid book I read yesterday!' said another friend to him.

'Upon my word!' cried the fool, 'I wonder you're not ashamed. That book's
good for nothing; every one's seen through it long ago. Didn't you know it?
You're quite behind the times.'

This friend too was alarmed, and he agreed with the fool.

'What a wonderful fellow my friend N. N. is!' said a third friend to the
fool. 'Now there's a really generous creature!'

'Upon my word!' cried the fool. 'N. N., the notorious scoundrel! He
swindled all his relations. Every one knows that. You're quite behind the
times.'

The third friend too was alarmed, and he agreed with the fool and deserted
his friend. And whoever and whatever was praised in the fool's presence, he
had the same retort for everything.

Sometimes he would add reproachfully: 'And do you still believe in
authorities?'

'Spiteful! malignant!' his friends began to say of the fool. 'But what a
brain!'

'And what a tongue!' others would add, 'Oh, yes, he has talent!'

It ended in the editor of a journal proposing to the fool that he should
undertake their reviewing column.

And the fool fell to criticising everything and every one, without in the
least changing his manner, or his exclamations.

Now he, who once declaimed against authorities, is himself an authority,
and the young men venerate him, and fear him.

And what else can they do, poor young men? Though one ought not, as a
general rule, to venerate any one … but in this case, if one didn't
venerate him, one would find oneself quite behind the times!

Fools have a good time among cowards.

[Tift]

Sanity
By Caroline Bird

I do kind gestures. Remove my appendix.
I put my ear to a flat shell and—nothing.
I play the lottery ironically. Get married.
Have a smear test. I put my ear to the beak
of a dead bird—nothing. I grow wisdom
teeth. Jog. I pick up a toddler’s telephone,
Hello?—No answer. I change a light bulb
on my own. Organize a large party. Hire
a clown. Attend a four-day stonewalling
course. Have a baby. Stop eating Coco Pops.
I put my ear right up to the slack and gaping
bonnet of a daffodil—. Get divorced. Floss.
Describe a younger person’s music taste as
“just noise.” Enjoy perusing a garden center.
Sit in a pub without drinking. I stand at the
lip of a pouting valley—speak to me!
My echo plagiarizes. I land a real love plus
two real cats. I never meet the talking bird
again. Or the yawning hole. The panther
of purple wisps who prowls inside the air.
I change nappies. Donate my eggs. Learn
a profound lesson about sacrifice. Brunch.
No singing floorboards. No vents leaking
scentless instructions. My mission is over.
The world has zipped up her second mouth.

[Tift]

Larkinesque
By Michael Ryan

Reading in the paper a summary
of a five-year psychological study
that shows those perceived as most beautiful
are treated differently,

I think they could have just asked me,
remembering a kind of pudgy kid
and late puberty, the bloody noses
and wisecracks because I wore glasses,

though we all know by now how awful it is
for the busty starlet no one takes seriously,
the loveliest women I’ve lunched with
lamenting the opacity of the body,

they can never trust a man’s interest
even when he seems not just out for sex
(eyes focus on me above rim of wineglass),
and who would want to live like this?

And what does beauty do to a man?—
Don Juan, Casanova, Lord Byron—
those fiery eyes and steel jawlines
can front a furnace of self-loathing,

all those breathless women rushing to him
while hubby’s at the office or ball game,
primed to be consumed by his beauty
while he stands next to it, watching.

So maybe the looks we’re dealt are best.
It’s only common sense that happiness
depends on some bearable deprivation
or defect, and who knows what conflicts

great beauty could have caused,
what cruelties one might have suffered
from those now friends, what unmanageable
possibilities smiling at every small turn?

So if I get up to draw a tumbler
of ordinary tap water and think what if this were
nectar dripping from delicious burning fingers,
will all I’ve missed knock me senseless?

No. Of course not. It won’t.

[Tift]

Two short untitled poems
by Emily Dickinson

A charm invests a face
Imperfectly beheld, –
The lady dare not lift her veil
For fear it be dispelled.

But peers beyond her mesh,
And wishes, and denies, –
Lest interview annul a want
That image satisfies.

---

Love is anterior to life,
  Posterior to death,
Initial of creation, and
  The exponent of breath.

[Tift]

This humorous verse is from an anthology of
mediaeval lyrics found in Munich in the early
19th century.  It had come there with other
flotsam after the dissolution of the monastery
of Bendictbeuern in upper Bavaria and is now
part of the better known collection, Carmina Burana.

The handwriting of this verse is 13th century.  Most of the
verses were more serious based on complaints on fortune,
and attacks on simony. But there are also love songs,
drinking songs, songs in praise of the vagabond order,
a profane gamblers' Mass and a few beggings songs.

Most verses were anonymous as is this one, written
by one of the many wandering latin scholars of the
time, who like the Latin tongue knew no frontiers:
“Swift and unstable as the swallows .. hither, thither,
like a leaf caught up by the wind or a spark in the
brushwood, we wander, unweariedly weary.”

The Grace of Giving
(Vagans loquitur)

Right and wrong they go about,
  Cheek by jowl together.
Lavishness can't keep in step
  Avarice his brother.
Virtue, even in the most
  Unusual moderation,
Seeking for the middle course,
  Vice on either side it, must
Look about her with the most
  Cautious contemplation.

You'll remember to have read
  In the works of Cato,
Where it is plainly set forth
  “Walk but with the worthy”.
If then you have set your mind
  On the grace of giving,
This of first importance is,
  He who now your debtor is,
Can he be regarded as
  Worthily receiving ?

Giving otherwise is but
  Virtue by repute,
Naught but relatively good,
  Not the absolute.
But would you be generous
  With security,
Have your glory on account,
  Value full with each amount,
Hesitate no more, but give
  What you have to me.
 

(notes are taken from a text by Helen Waddell)

[Tift]

Two Poems by Wendy Cope

Bloody Men

Bloody men are like bloody buses –
You wait for about a year
And as soon as one approaches your stop
Two or three others appear.

You look at them flashing their indicators,
offering you a ride.
You're trying to read the destinations,
You haven't much time to decide.

If you make a mistake, there is no turning back.
Jump off, and you'll stand there and gaze
While the cars and the taxis and lorries go by
And the minutes, the hours, the days,

Flowers

Some men never think of it.
You did.  You'd come along
And say you'd nearly brought me flowers
But something had gone wrong.

The shop was closed.  Or you had doubts –
The sort that minds like ours
Dream up incessantly.  You thought
I might not want your flowers.

It made me smile and hug you then.
Now I can only smile.
But, look, the flowers you nearly brought
Have lasted all this while.

[Tift]

Pity the Beautiful
By Dana Gioia

Pity the beautiful,
the dolls, and the dishes,
the babes with big daddies
granting their wishes.

Pity the pretty boys,
the hunks, and Apollos,
the golden lads whom
success always follows.

The hotties, the knock-outs,
the tens out of ten,
the drop-dead gorgeous,
the great leading men.

Pity the faded,
the bloated, the blowsy,
the paunchy Adonis
whose luck’s gone lousy.

Pity the gods,
no longer divine.
Pity the night
the stars lose their shine.

[Tift]

Long Island Sound
By Emma Lazarus

I see it as it looked one afternoon
In August,— by a fresh soft breeze o’erblown.
The swiftness of the tide, the light thereon,
A far-off sail, white as a crescent moon.
The shining waters with pale currents strewn,
The quiet fishing-smacks, the Eastern cove,
The semi-circle of its dark, green grove.
The luminous grasses, and the merry sun
In the grave sky; the sparkle far and wide,
Laughter of unseen children, cheerful chirp
Of crickets, and low lisp of rippling tide,
Light summer clouds fantastical as sleep
Changing unnoted while I gazed thereon.
All these fair sounds and sights I made my own.

[Tift]

I've always liked Emerson for the way he described all prayer
as being a disease of the intellect – a little like the lottery although
with that you have a chance of having your prayer answered.

The Past
By Ralph Waldo Emerson

The debt is paid,
The verdict said,
The Furies laid,
The plague is stayed,
All fortunes made;
Turn the key and bolt the door,
Sweet is death forevermore.
Nor haughty hope, nor swart chagrin,
Nor murdering hate, can enter in.
All is now secure and fast;
Not the gods can shake the Past;
Flies-to the adamantine door
Bolted down forevermore.
None can re-enter there,—
No thief so politic,
No Satan with a royal trick
Steal in by window, chink, or hole,
To bind or unbind, add what lacked,
Insert a leaf, or forge a name,
New-face or finish what is packed,
Alter or mend eternal Fact.

[Tift]

Dear Mr Lawrence, you are so witty
(and correct)

The English are so nice
D.H. Lawrence

The English are so nice
so awfully nice
they are the nicest people in the world.

And what's more, they're very nice about being nice
about your being nice as well!
If you're not nice they soon make you feel it.

Americans and French and Germans and so on
they're all very well
but they're not really nice, you know.
They're not nice in our sense of the word, are they now?

That's why one doesn't have to take them seriously.
We must be nice to them, of course,
of course, naturally.
But it doesn't really matter what you say to them,
they don't really understand
you can just say anything to them:
be nice, you know, just nice
but you must never take them seriously, they wouldn't understand,
just be nice, you know! Oh, fairly nice,
not too nice of course, they take advantage
but nice enough, just nice enough
to let them feel they're not quite as nice as they might be.

1932

[Tift]

Don't Tell the World that You're Waiting for Me
by Eliza Cook

Three summers have gone since the first time we met, love,
And still 'tis in vain that I ask thee to wed ;
I hear no reply but a gentle ” Not yet, love,”
With a smile of your lip, and a shake of your head.
Ah ! how oft have I whispered, how oft have I sued thee,
And breathed my soul's question of ” When shall it be ?”
You know, dear, how long and how truly I've wooed thee,
So don't tell the world that you're waiting for me.

I have fashioned a home, where the fairies might dwell, love,
I've planted the myrtle, the rose, and the vine ;
But the cottage to me is a mere hermit's cell, love,
And the bloom will be dull till the flowers are thine.
I've a ring of bright gold, which I gaze on when lonely,
And sigh with Hope's eloquence, ” When will it be ?”
There needs but thy ” Yes,” love–one little word only,
So don't tell the world that you're waiting for me.

[Tift]

The Hawthorn Tree
by Willa Cather

Across the shimmering meadows–
Ah, when he came to me!
In the spring-time,
In the night-time,
In the starlight,
Beneath the hawthorn tree.

Up from the misty marsh-land–
Ah, when he climbed to me!
To my white bower,
To my sweet rest,
To my warm breast,
Beneath the hawthorn tree.

Ask of me what the birds sang,
High in the hawthorn tree;
What the breeze tells,
What the rose smells,
What the stars shine–
Not what he said to me!

[img]https://i.imgur.com/6mI2Uza.jpg?1[/img]

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