Cool thread

Did This Happen to Your Mother?
Did Your Sister Throw Up a Lot?
Alice Walker

I love a man who is not worth
my love.
Did this happen to your mother?
Did your grandmother wake up
for no good reason
in the middle of the night?

I thought love could be controlled.
It cannot.
Only behavior can be controlled.
By biting your tongue purple
rather than speak.
Mauling your lips.
Obliterating his number
too thoroughly
to be able to phone.

Love has made me sick.

Did your sister throw up a lot?
Did your cousin complain
of a painful knot
in her back?
Did your aunt always
seem to have something else
troubling her mind?

I thought love would adapt itself
to my needs
But needs grow too fast;
they come up like weeds.
Through cracks in the conversation.
Through silences in the dark.
Through everything you thought was concrete.

Such needful love has to be chopped out
or forced to wilt back,
poisoned by disapproval
from it's own soil.

This is bad news, for the conservationist.

My hand shakes before this killing.
My stomach sits jumpy in my chest.
My chest is the Grand Canyon
sprawled empty
over the world.

Whoever he is, he is not worth all this.

And I will never
unclench my teeth long enough
to tell him so.

Blues for Dante Alighieri
....without hope we live on in desire....
INFERNO, IV



Our room was too small, the sheets scratchy and hot—
Our room was a kind of hell, we thought,
and killed a half-liter of Drambuie we'd bought.

We walked over the Arno and back across.
We walked all day, and in the evening, lost,
argued and wandered in circles. At last

we found our hotel. The next day we left for Rome.
We found the Intercontinental, and a church full of bones,
and ate takeout Chinese in our suite, alone.

It wasn't a great journey, only a side trip.
It wasn't love for eternity, or any such crap;
it was just something that happened....

We packed suitcases, returned the rental car.
We packed souvenirs, and repaired to the airport bar
and talked about pornography, and movie stars.



Kim Addonizio
Poetry
Volume CLXXXI, Number 2

Hey babe, I'd like to talk to you
How's about coming back to my room for a little boom boom

You keep coming to me (you keep coming to me)
I can feel you're dynamite (I can feel you're dynamite)
Know where you move, get in the groove
You're driving me crazy, crazy for you

Second time you move your feet, it's fine for us to boom boom
You can come, get close to me and feel the burning fire
All the time you've got the beat, it's fine for us to boom boom
Can't you see this spunk in me and feel my strong desire

Boom boom boom, let's go back to my room
So we can do it all night and you can make me feel right (oh oh oh)
Boom boom boom, let's go back to my room
So we can do it all night and you can make me feel right

To be or not to be (to be or not to be)
Don't you know I'd like a bite (don't you know I'd like a bite)
Get to love you, closer to you
You're driving me crazy, crazy for you

Second time you move your feet, it's fine for us to boom boom
You can come, get close to me and feel the burning fire
All the time you've got the beat, it's fine for us to boom boom
Can't you see this spunk in me and feel my strong desire

Boom boom boom, let's go back to my room
So we can do it all night and you can make me feel right (oh oh oh)
Boom boom boom, let's go back to my room
So we can do it all night and you can make me feel right

2the9s said:

Great now that's stuck in my head!

2the9s said:

I can"t read that!

NINES!!!!

starkitty said:

I think that's Auden!

Because I would be remiss if I didn't:


"Phenomenal Woman"
by Maya Angelou

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,
It's in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It's the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can't touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can't see.
I say,
It's in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I'm a woman

Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Now you understand
Just why my head's not bowed.
I don't shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It's in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
'Cause I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Si tú te vas

Si tú te vas
te llevarás mi corazón
y yo sin ti
ya no sé por dónde ir

Si tú te vas
nunca te podré olvidar
me quedo aquí
sólo pensando en ti

Si tú te vas
el dolor me comerá
un día más
no podré vivir sin ti

Mis lágrimas hacen un mar
nadaré sin descansar
esperando tu llegar
y es que estoy

Imaginándome el final
y me da miedo pensar
que algún día llegará
si tú te vas

Si tú te vas
se me irá todo el valor
y yo sé que
nunca encontraré otra igual

Si tú te vas
el dolor me comerá
un día más
no podré vivir sin ti

Mis lágrimas hacen un mar
nadaré sin descansar
esperando tu llegar
y es que estoy
imaginándome el final
y me da miedo pensar
que algún día llegará
Si tú te vas
Si tú te vas
Si tú te vas
Si tú te vas

Mis lágrimas hacen un mar
nadaré sin descansar
esperando tu llegar
y es que estoy
imaginándome el final
y me da miedo pensar
que algún día llegará
Si tú te vas

yeah this is about right ...



Alone ~Maya Angelou


Lying, thinking
Last night
How to find my soul a home
Where water is not thirsty
And bread loaf is not stone
I came up with one thing
And I don't believe I'm wrong
That nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

There are some millionaires
With money they can't use
Their wives run round like banshees
Their children sing the blues
They've got expensive doctors
To cure their hearts of stone.
But nobody
No, nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Now if you listen closely
I'll tell you what I know
Storm clouds are gathering
The wind is gonna blow
The race of man is suffering
And I can hear the moan,
'Cause nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Sweeny79 said:

nesseone said:

leaves of grass - w whitman



an excerpt of one of my faves

I CELEBRATE myself;
And what I assume you shall assume;
For every atom belonging to me, as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my Soul;
I lean and loafe at my ease, observing a spear of summer grass. 5

Houses and rooms are full of perfumes—the shelves are crowded with perfumes;
I breathe the fragrance myself, and know it and like it;
The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.

The atmosphere is not a perfume—it has no taste of the distillation—it is odorless;
It is for my mouth forever—I am in love with it; 10
I will go to the bank by the wood, and become undisguised and naked;
I am mad for it to be in contact with me.

2

The smoke of my own breath;
Echoes, ripples, buzz’d whispers, love-root, silk-thread, crotch and vine;
My respiration and inspiration, the beating of my heart, the passing of blood and air through my lungs; 15
The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore, and dark-color’d sea-rocks, and of hay in the barn;
The sound of the belch’d words of my voice, words loos’d to the eddies of the wind;
A few light kisses, a few embraces, a reaching around of arms;
The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs wag;
The delight alone, or in the rush of the streets, or along the fields and hill-sides; 20
The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising from bed and meeting the sun.

Have you reckon’d a thousand acres much? have you reckon’d the earth much?
Have you practis’d so long to learn to read?
Have you felt so proud to get at the meaning of poems?

Stop this day and night with me, and you shall possess the origin of all poems; 25
You shall possess the good of the earth and sun—(there are millions of suns left;)
You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look through the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in books;
You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me:
You shall listen to all sides, and filter them from yourself.

3

I have heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the beginning and the end; 30
But I do not talk of the beginning or the end.

There was never any more inception than there is now,
Nor any more youth or age than there is now;
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now. 35

Urge, and urge, and urge;
Always the procreant urge of the world.

Out of the dimness opposite equals advance—always substance and increase, always sex;
Always a knit of identity—always distinction—always a breed of life.

To elaborate is no avail—learn’d and unlearn’d feel that it is so. 40

Sure as the most certain sure, plumb in the uprights, well entretied, braced in the beams,
Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical,
I and this mystery, here we stand.

Clear and sweet is my Soul, and clear and sweet is all that is not my Soul.

Lack one lacks both, and the unseen is proved by the seen, 45
Till that becomes unseen, and receives proof in its turn.

Showing the best, and dividing it from the worst, age vexes age;
Knowing the perfect fitness and equanimity of things, while they discuss I am silent, and go bathe and admire myself.

Welcome is every organ and attribute of me, and of any man hearty and clean;
Not an inch, nor a particle of an inch, is vile, and none shall be less familiar than the rest. 50

I am satisfied—I see, dance, laugh, sing:
As the hugging and loving Bed-fellow sleeps at my side through the night, and withdraws at the peep of the day, with stealthy tread,
Leaving me baskets cover’d with white towels, swelling the house with their plenty,
Shall I postpone my acceptation and realization, and scream at my eyes,
That they turn from gazing after and down the road, 55
And forthwith cipher and show me a cent,
Exactly the contents of one, and exactly the contents of two, and which is ahead?

4

Trippers and askers surround me;
People I meet—the effect upon me of my early life, or the ward and city I live in, or the nation,
The latest dates, discoveries, inventions, societies, authors old and new, 60
My dinner, dress, associates, looks, compliments, dues,
The real or fancied indifference of some man or woman I love,
The sickness of one of my folks, or of myself, or ill-doing, or loss or lack of money, or depressions or exaltations;
Battles, the horrors of fratricidal war, the fever of doubtful news, the fitful events;
These come to me days and nights, and go from me again, 65
But they are not the Me myself.

Apart from the pulling and hauling stands what I am;
Stands amused, complacent, compassionating, idle, unitary;
Looks down, is erect, or bends an arm on an impalpable certain rest,
Looking with side-curved head, curious what will come next; 70
Both in and out of the game, and watching and wondering at it.

Backward I see in my own days where I sweated through fog with linguists and contenders;
I have no mockings or arguments—I witness and wait.

5

I believe in you, my Soul—the other I am must not abase itself to you;
And you must not be abased to the other. 75

Loafe with me on the grass—loose the stop from your throat;
Not words, not music or rhyme I want—not custom or lecture, not even the best;
Only the lull I like, the hum of your valved voice.

I mind how once we lay, such a transparent summer morning;
How you settled your head athwart my hips, and gently turn’d over upon me, 80
And parted the shirt from my bosom-bone, and plunged your tongue to my bare-stript heart,
And reach’d till you felt my beard, and reach’d till you held my feet.

Swiftly arose and spread around me the peace and knowledge that pass all the argument of the earth;
And I know that the hand of God is the promise of my own,
And I know that the spirit of God is the brother of my own; 85
And that all the men ever born are also my brothers, and the women my sisters and lovers;
And that a kelson of the creation is love;
And limitless are leaves, stiff or drooping in the fields;
And brown ants in the little wells beneath them;
And mossy scabs of the worm fence, and heap’d stones, elder, mullen and poke-weed. 90

6

A child said, What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands;
How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is, any more than he.

I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green stuff woven.

Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
A scented gift and remembrancer, designedly dropt, 95
Bearing the owner’s name someway in the corners, that we may see and remark, and say, Whose?

Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the vegetation.

Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic;
And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones,
Growing among black folks as among white; 100
Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I receive them the same.

And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves.

(thank you shaus)

YOU'LL LOVE ME YET

Author: Robert Browning

You'll love me yet!--and I can tarry
Your love's protracted growing;
June rear'd that bunch of flowers you carry
From seeds of April's sowing.

I plant a heartful now: some seed
At least is sure to strike,
And yield--what you'll not pluck indeed,
Not love, but, may be, like.

You'll look at least on love's remains,
A grave's one violet:
Your look?--that pays a thousand pains.
What's death? You'll love me yet!

Basket of Figs
by Ellen Bass


Bring me your pain, love. Spread
it out like fine rugs, silk sashes,
warm eggs, cinnamon
and cloves in burlap sacks. Show me

the detail, the intricate embroidery
on the collar, tiny shell buttons,
the hem stitched the way you were taught,
pricking just a thread, almost invisible.

Unclasp it like jewels, the gold
still hot from your body. Empty
your basket of figs. Spill your wine.

That hard nugget of pain, I would suck it,
cradling it on my tongue like the slick
seed of pomegranate. I would lift it

tenderly, as a great animal might
carry a small one in the private
cave of the mouth.

starkitty said:

I don't know that one, but I love Browning!

2the9s said:

He's great, for a dude that was overshadowed by a more talented wife.

sucks edit
[This message was edited Fri May 14 8:57:29 2004 by crazyhorse]

Nice.

Keep doin' it to death, y'all.

I Am on My Way to Oklahoma to Bury the Man I Nearly Left
My Husband For

Your name doesn't matter.
I loved you.
We loved.
The years

I waited
by the river for your pickup
truck to find me. Footprints
scattered in the yellow sand.
Husband, mother
in law, kids wondering
where I'd gone.

You wouldn't
the years I begged. Would
the years I wouldn't. Only
one of us had sense at a time.

I won't see you again.
I guess life presents you
choices and you choose. Smarter
over the years. Oh smarter.
The sensible thing smarting
over the years, the sensible
thing to excess, I guess.

My life deed I have
done to artistic extreme I
drag you with me. Must wake
early. Ride north tomorrow.
Send you off. Are you fine?
I think of you often, friend,
and fondly.


Sandra Cisneros

Moonbeam

The mist rose with a little sound. Like a thud.
Which was the heart beating. And the sun rose, briefly diluted.
And after what seemed years, it sank again
and twilight washed over the shore and deepened there.
And from out of nowhere lovers came,
people who still had bodies and hearts. Who still had
arms, legs, mouths, although by day they might be
housewives and businessmen.

The same night also produced people like ourselves.
You are like me, whether or not you admit it.
Unsatisfied, meticulous. And your hunger is not for experience
but for understanding, as though it could be had in the abstract.

Then it's daylight again and the world goes back to normal.
The lovers smooth their hair; the moon resumes its hollow existence.
And the beach belongs again to mysterious birds
soon to appear on postage stamps.

But what of our memories, the memories of those who depend on images?
Do they count for nothing?

The mist rose, taking back proof of love.
Without which we have only the mirror, you and I.


Louise Gluck

starkitty said:

I like that very much.

Borderline prose...

TheFrog said:

I struggle with that myself (see the very first poem posted).

I like it, too.

Grand Abacus
- John Ashbery


Perhaps this valley too leads into the head of long-ago days.
What, if not its commercial and etiolated visage, could break through the
meadow wires?
It placed a chair in the meadow and then went far away.
People come to visit in summer, they do not think about the head.
Soldiers come down to see the head. The stick hides from them.
The heavens say, "Here I am, boys and girls!"
The stick tries to hide in the noise. The leaves, happy, drift over the dusty
meadow.
"I'd like to see it," someone said about the head, which has stopped
pretending to be a town.
Look! A ghastly change has come over it. The ears fall off - they are
laughing people.
The skin is perhaps children, they say, "We children," and are vague near the
sea. The eyes-
Wait! What large raindrops! The eyes-
Wait, can't you see them pattering, in the meadow, like a dog?
The eyes are all glorious! And now the river comes to sweep away the last of
us.
Who knew it, at the beginning of the day?
It is best to travel like a comet, with the others, though one does not see
them.
How far that bridle flashed! "Hurry up, children!" The birds fly back, they
say, "We were lying,
We do not want to fly away." But it is already too late. The children have
vanished.

Some Spike Milligan.

A Silly Poem

"Said Hamlet to Ophelia,
I'll draw a sketch of thee,
What kind of pencil shall I use?
2B or not 2B?"


The Lion

"If you're attacked by a Lion,
Find fresh underpants to try on.
Lay on the ground quite still,
Pretend you are very ill.
Keep like that day after day -
Perhaps the lion will go away."

THE ROAD NOT TAKEN
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
-Robert Frost

my fave poem next to phenomenal woman