W.S. Merwin : "The Heart"

 

In the first chamber of the heart

all the gloves are hanging but two

the hands are bare as they come through the door

the bell rope is moving without them

they move forward cupped as though 

holding water

there is a bird bathing in their palms

in this chamber there is no color

In the second chamber of the heart

all the blindfolds are hanging but one

the eyes are open as they come in

they see the bell rope moving 

without hands

they see the bathing bird

being carried forward

through the colored chamber

In the third chamber of the heart

all sounds are hanging but one

the ears hear nothing as they come through the door

the bell rope is moving like a breath

without hands

a bird is being carried forward

bathing

in total silence.

In the last chamber of the heart

all the words are hanging

but one

the blood is naked as it steps through the door 

with its eyes open

and a bathing bird in its hands

and with its bare feet on the sill

moving as through on water

to the one stroke of the bell

someone is ringing without hands

The Essential  W.S. Merwin

Edited by Michael Wiegers

Copper Canyon Press, 2017

before The Giver

 

Seamus Heaney: "Follower"

My father worked with a horse-plough,
His shoulders like a full sail strung

Between the shafts and the furrow.

The horses strained at his clicking tongue.

An expert. He would set the wing

And fit the bright steel-pointed sock.

The sod rolled over without breaking.

At the headrig, with a single pluck

Of reins, the sweating team turned round

And back into the land. His eye 

Narrowed and angled at the ground,

Mapping the furrow exactly.

I stumbled in his hobnailed wake,

Fell sometimes on the polished sod;

Sometimes he rode me on his back

Dipping and rising to his plod.

I wanted to grow up and plough,

To close one eye, stiffen my arm.

All I ever did was follow

In his broad shadow round the farm.

I was a nuisance, tripping, falling,

Yapping always. But today

It is my father who keeps stumbling 

Behind me, and will not go away.

Seamus Heaney "100 Poems"

Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2018 

Stephen Crane (1871-1900): "I Saw a Man Pursuing The Horizon"

 

I saw a man pursuing the horizon;

Round and round they sped.

I was disturbed at this;

I accosted the man.

"It is futile," I said,

"You can never --- "

"You lie," he cried,

And ran on.

101 Great American Poems 

Dover Thrift Editions 1998

Edited by The American Poetry & Literacy Project (AP&L Project) Andrew Carroll  Joseph Brodsky

H. W. Longfellow (1807-1882): "The Arrow and The Song"

 

I shot an arrow into the air,

It fell to earth, I knew not where;

For, so swiftly it flew, the sight

Could not follow it in its flight.

I breathed a song into the air,

It fell to earth, I knew not where;

For who has sight so keen and strong,

That it can follow the flight of song?

Long, long afterward, in an oak

I found the arrow, still unbroke,

And the song, from beginning to end,

I found again in the heart of a friend.

101 Great American Poets

Dover Thrifts Editions 1998

Edited by The American Poetry & Literacy Project (AP&L Project)

Once upon a time ...

 

Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886): 'Im nobody! Who are you?'

 

I'm nobody! Who are you?

Are you nobody, too?

Then there's a pair of us - don't tell!

They'd banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!

How public, like a frog

To tell your name the livelong day

To an admiring bog!

101 Great American Poems

Dover Thrift Editions 1998

Edited by The American Poetry & Literacy Project (AP&L Project)