Marge Piercy (March 31, 1936 -) What can they doto you? Whatever they want.They can set you up, they canbust you, they can breakyour fingers, they canburn your brain with electricity,blur you with drugs till youcan't walk, can't remember, they cantake your child, wall upyour lover. They can do anythingyou can't stop themfrom doing. How …
Letitia Elizabeth Landon – Home
Letitia Elizabeth Landon (August 14, 1802 – October 15, 1838) Aye, here, dear love, is just a home, Like what our home should be;A home of peace—a home of love— As made for thee and me. A cottage with its roof of thatch, Its porch of the red rose,Its white walls hidden by the wreath …
Henri Cole – Daffodils
Henri Cole (1956 -) Sometimes I arrive with my buds closed,and I am mistaken for scallions,but if you cut a half inch from my stemsand put me in water, I open up and releaseyellow dust from my petal cups,like talcum sprinkled on her shouldersafter she bathes and swallows herthird tranquillizer to erase herself,the sedative piercing …
Emily Brontë – Remembrance
Emily Jane Brontë (July 30, 1818 – December 19, 1848) Cold in the earth—and the deep snow piled above thee,Far, far removed, cold in the dreary grave!Have I forgot, my only Love, to love thee,Severed at last by Time's all-severing wave?Now, when alone, do my thoughts no longer hoverOver the mountains, on that northern shore,Resting …
Richard Jones – The Loft
Richard Jones I lay on her bedwhile she opened windowsso we could see the riverand the factories beyond.Afternoon light fallingbeautifully into the room,she burned candles,incense, talking quietlyas I listened—I, who conspiredto make this happen,weaving a web of words that heldthis moment at its center.What could I say now?That I am a manempty of desire?She stood …
Tadeusz Dąbrowski – Sentence
Tadeusz Dąbrowski It’s as if you’d woken in a locked cell and foundin your pocket a slip of paper, and on it a single sentencein a language you don’t know.And you’d be sure this sentence was the key to yourlife. Also to this cell.And you’d spend years trying to decipher the sentence,until finally you’d understand …
Emily Dickinson – A Light Exists In Spring
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson (December 10, 1830 – May 15, 1886) A Light exists in SpringNot present on the YearAt any other period-When March is scarcely hereA Color stands abroadOn Solitary FieldsThat Science cannot overtakeBut Human Nature feels.It waits upon the Lawn,It shows the furthest TreeUpon the furthest Slope you knowIt almost speaks to you.Then as …
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William Wordsworth – I Have Thoughts That Are Fed By The Sun
William Wordsworth (April 07, 1770 – April 23, 1850) I have thoughts that are fed by the sun:The things which I seeAre welcome to me,Welcome every one –I do not wish to lieDead, dead,Dead, without any company.Here alone on my bedWith thoughts that are fed by the sun,And hopes that are welcome every one,Happy am …
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Aria Aber – Afghan Funeral In Paris
Aria Aber The aunts here clink Malbec glassesand parade their grief with musky, expensive scentsthat whisper in elevators and hallways.Each natural passing articulatesthe unnatural: every aunt has a sonwho fell, or a daughter who hid in rubblefor two years, until that knock of officersholding a bin bag filled with a dressand bones. But what do …
Marge Piercy – The New Year of the Trees
Marge Piercy (March 31, 1936 -) It is the New Year of the Trees, but herethe ground is frozen under the crust of snow.The trees snooze, their buds tight as nuts.Rhododendron leaves roll up their stiff scrolls.In the white and green north of the diasporaI am stirred by a season that will not arrivefor six …
Lisel Mueller – Hope
Lisel Mueller (February 8, 1924 – February 21, 2020) It hovers in dark cornersbefore the lights are turned on,it shakes sleep from its eyesand drops from mushroom gills,it explodes in the starry headsof dandelions turned sages,it sticks to the wings of green angelsthat sail from the tops of maples. It sprouts in each occluded eyeof …
