Home

Just Home and Love! the words are small

Four letters unto each;

And yet you will not find in all

The wide and gracious range of speech

Two more so tenderly complete

-Robert William Service

Dear Darling

Alright babycakes, it's time for me to come clean

I couldn't ever handle being your last resort;

I can't stand it when you call too late,

after yet another cancelled date.

I hate it when you let me down

and then don't apo-lo-gize, just frown.

I'm not someone you can take for granted, sweets

without feeling it come back atcha tenfold.

My world doesn't work this way darling

stop fucking up my groove,

please and thanks.

Make no mistake - in this scenario,

you are the asshole. Comprendes, compadre?

I have left you in the dust

and will only come back to spit on

you-r crocodile tears

or laugh at your stumbles

A sight more than you ever gave me-

my mirth will be genuine.

I'm holding you in contempt of court,

time is the only thing that'll regain my trust,

but I doubt you'll find the will

or the lust.

So piss-off, jack-off

and face up to facts.

I don't dig this fakeness

- I never needed your pity or your guilt,

Fact is, it only makes me want to puke,

all over your fucking face.

-Amitaya Libern

Zebras

And my only exception

was you

To all of the careful lines;

I've drawn circles and

prisons of patterns and

mazes

around me, since forever,

again and again

The only exception there's ever been,

you joined me in my circle and helped me draw,

not traps,

but line drawings,

not mazes,

but murals,

not prisons, but poetry.

For just a little while, you set me free.

-Kristian Regale

Haiku 1

I have died and dreamed

myself back to your arms where

what I died for sleeps.

-Sonia Sanchez

Jabberwocky

"Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand;
Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

"And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!"
He chortled in his joy.

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

-Lewis Carroll

Sonnet 69

Maybe nothingness is to be without your presence,

without you moving, slicing the noon

like a blue flower, without you walking

later through the fog and the cobbles,

without the light you carry in your hand,

golden, which maybe others will not see,

which maybe no one knew was growing

like the red beginnings of a rose.

In short, without your presence: without your coming

suddenly, incitingly, to know my life,

gust of a rosebush, wheat of wind:

since then I am because you are,

since then you are, I am, we are,

and through love I will be, you will be, we'll be.

-Pablo Neruda

on the state-sanctioned murder of shaka sankofa

they are killing me tonight, they are murdering me tonight.

8:49 pm pronounced dead, with one eye open.

these names i place in my mouth tonight. shaka sankofa, amadou

diallo, and mumia abu-jamal. these names familiar on my tongue. all

african, muslim names. all eastern, all other. until the end of his

breath, shaka sankofa, born gary graham, urged black power. march

on, black people, he said.

dead. and an example, now, to all people. a promise of what is to

come. state-sanctioned killings of innocents. a white towel they

placed on his face, to cover his stare.

i place these names in my mouth, and think of how american the name

shaka tastes. how american mumia sounds. and the names of men we

love who are called after prophets, nations, blood lines, warriors.

the men we love who can neer have enough eye witnesses. the state

will turn back even god's eye, and witness murder easily.

if i could talk right now, i'd call my girl, and tell her to keep our

son inside. to shape his head into a bullet-proof crown. i'd

whisper my intimates' names into a secret pot, bury it under a tree,

and pray for strength to grow. i'd at least scream this pain out

into the street. rage at this night. i'd call wbai and say, i don't

know what to say. my sisters are somewhere tonight, broken down one

more time.

and what are we gonna do? shut what down? boycott whom? appeal to

which court?

and a 17-year-old gary graham, criminalized since birth. chose the

name for himself sankofa. a ghanian word, meaning to learn from the

past. transformed himself into a soul outside of bars and skin and

even death.

it is hope they killed.

it is life they ate.

i love you, he said several times. i love you. learn from the past.

george bush jr. is a murderer, as is his father. learn from the

past. we still have mumia. learn from the past. i love you, he

said. one eye open. i love you. sankofa.

62200 10:49 pm

-Suheir Hammad (New York)

from 'Bum Rush the Page' a def poetry jam

Sonnet 29

When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes,

I all alone beweep my outcast state,

And trouble deaf Heaven with my bootless cries,

And look upon myself, and curse my fate,

Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,

Featur'd like him, like him with friends possess'd,

Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope,

With what I most enjoy contented least:

Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,

Haply I think on thee, --and then my state

(Like to the lark at break of day arising

From sullen earth) sings hymns at

heaven's gate;

For thy sweet love remember'd such wealth brings

That then I scorn to change my state with kings'.

-William Shakespeare

Diner

My eggs will never be dry

when I am with you

and no matter how much

I am told to be professional,

when your lips stare at me

like they are hungry

for what is finally real,

and your eyes speak to me as if

they see millennium,

I am the butter

melting on your toast.

-RoByn Baron

Silence

I sit here, waiting.

An unknown signal shall sound,

and I shall arise.

-Frank Mandarine

To You.

STRANGER! if you, passing, meet me, and desire to speak to me, why

should you

not speak to me?

And why should I not speak to you?

-Walt Whitman

Fall

i have been drunk since

summer, sure you would

come to sift the waves

until they flaked like

diamonds over our flanks.

i have no moved

even when wild

horses, with snouts like pigs

came to violate me,

i squatted in

my baptism.

O hear the sea

galloping like stallions

toward spring.

-Sonia Sanchez

Haiku (for you)

love between us is

speech and breath. loving you is

a long river running.

-Sonia Sanchez

Unknown Title

I looked and saw your eyes in the shadow of your hair

As a traveller sees the stream in the shadow of the wood

I looked and saw your heart in the shadow of your eyes

As a seeker sees the gold in the shadow of the stream

I looked and saw your love in the shadow of your heart

As a diver sees the pearl in the shadow of the sea

-Dante Gabriele Rossetti

To One Unsatisfied

When, with all the loved around thee,

Still thy heart says, "I am lonely,"

It is well; the truth hath found thee:

Rest is with the Father only.

-George MacDonald

Feminist or a Womanist

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQOmyebFVV8

-Staceyann Chin

An Asian Am Anthem

Way back

to the yes yes y'alls

when I tagged bathroom stalls and my brother had new wave posters wall

to wall

I dreamt of the times they dropped Agent Orange and called it Kool Aid

bound our feet and called it first aid

Woke up into a spirit rotation, a soul inflation: the Asian Persuasion

Asian my orientation, Asian American my nation

wanted to kick specifics about being Asian pacific

but they taxed my syntax/orientalized my oriental eyes

and blinded me with Full Metal Jacketed lies

While overseas/policies/let bygones become icons

on desktops/double click to open windows/into sweatshops

tried to get out but the doors were Jessica McLint-locked

Never the mellow yellow but rather yelled and bellowed

at those white fellows who knocked me down

but I got back the fuck up again

coaxed by folk hymns, dead ringer for the revolution

leaving behind the brainwashed contusions,

red white and blue confusions

in a nation of computer generated illusions

They offered fame contracts/complete with blue contacts

assimilationist hot dish/slit skin and split my ancestor's bones for a wish

buried our history under haunted trees

taught self hate by their taunts of Chinese Japanese dirty knees

They want to halt our progress

but we left 'em behind cuz we got more sides than a stop sign

unwind tongues/rewind time/to study our story and sing this song

with sloppy mathematics calculate the ragged ratio

of this yellow braggadocio and blow the speakers to their stereo/types

Hai Ba Trung delegated to a ching chong pantheon

but we castrate and bat around their white balls cuz we the ping pong

champions

so fuck their Buddha boxes and Bindi kits:

fake ass renditions of our ancient cultural traditions

we reclaim, remind, retwist our minds

for our persistence of resistance

this thing called us/flush/bullshit to flourish/nourish

like rice ciphers/decipher/cropped tongues from here to trife times

with truth rhymes/our wind chime choruses/forming audible life lines/

we recite/overturn/with vocal overtures

Asian American anthem

beyond Suzie Wong and Hop Sing bows

I'm singing for ya'll/so can ya hear me now

this is for my people who got turned down

but refused to yield

for Hawaii sun sweat in sugar cane fields

for sisters pissed at Ling on Ally McBeal

for my brothers who stay strong without the steel

for those not on their knees from slipping on their own

banana peels

brainwashed colorblind

pushed aside

for culture pride

They can't evade this Asian American invasion

Yellow Nation

made up of crews rollin in Isuzus

with the buddhist trinkets ya mama gave you

hanging from the rearview

they call us slant-eyed

but we're clear view

and they're see thru

Don't be fooled, ya'll.

When will they learn?

The only time they see the light

is when their houses burn

Yellow Nation

time to

get up

wake up

stand up

make up

take up

lash out

strike out

make out

break

out

-Thien-bao Thue Phi (Minneapolis)

from Bum Rush the Page, a Def Poetry Jam compilation

Did I Miss Anything?

Nothing. When we realized you weren’t here
we sat with our hands folded on our desks
in silence, for the full two hours

Everything. I gave an exam worth
40 percent of the grade for this term
and assigned some reading due today
on which I’m about to hand out a quiz
worth 50 percent

Nothing. None of the content of this course
has value or meaning
Take as many days off as you like:
any activities we undertake as a class
I assure you will not matter either to you or me
and are without purpose

Everything. A few minutes after we began last time
a shaft of light suddenly descended and an angel
or other heavenly being appeared
and revealed to us what each woman or man must do
to attain divine wisdom in this life and
the hereafter
This is the last time the class will meet
before we disperse to bring the good news to all people
on earth.

Nothing. When you are not present
how could something significant occur?

Everything. Contained in this classroom
is a microcosm of human experience
assembled for you to query and examine and ponder
This is not the only place such an opportunity has been
gathered

but it was one place

And you weren’t here

-Tom Wayman

Where the Sidewalk Ends

There is a place where the sidewalk ends
And before the street begins,
And there the grass grows soft and white,
And there the sun burns crimson bright,
And there the moon-bird rests from his flight
To cool in the peppermint wind.

Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black
And the dark street winds and bends.
Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow
We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And watch where the chalk-white arrows go
To the place where the sidewalk ends.

Yes we'll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And we'll go where the chalk-white arrows go,
For the children, they mark, and the children, they know
The place where the sidewalk ends.

-Shel Silverstein

Poem No 3

i gather up

each sound

you left behind

and stretch them

on our bed.

each nite

i breathe you

and become high.

-Sonia Sanchez

Our Greatest Fear

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.

It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant,
gorgeous, handsome, talented and fabulous?

Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.

Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won't feel insecure around you.
We are all meant to shine, as children do.

We were born to make manifest the glory of God within us.
It is not just in some; it is in everyone.

And, as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give
other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear,
our presence automatically liberates others.

—Marianne Williamson

A Dream Deferred

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up

Like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore-

And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat

Or crust and sugar over-

Like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags

Like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

-Langston Hughes

To His Coy Mistress

Had we but world enough, and time, This coyness, lady, were no crime. We would sit down and think which way To walk, and pass our long love's day; Thou by the Indian Ganges' side Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide Of Humber would complain. I would Love you ten years before the Flood; And you should, if you please, refuse Till the conversion of the Jews. My vegetable love should grow Vaster than empires, and more slow. An hundred years should go to praise Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze; Two hundred to adore each breast, But thirty thousand to the rest; An age at least to every part, And the last age should show your heart. For, lady, you deserve this state, Nor would I love at lower rate. But at my back I always hear Time's winged chariot hurrying near; And yonder all before us lie Deserts of vast eternity. Thy beauty shall no more be found, Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound My echoing song; then worms shall try That long preserv'd virginity, And your quaint honour turn to dust, And into ashes all my lust. The grave's a fine and private place, But none I think do there embrace. Now therefore, while the youthful hue Sits on thy skin like morning dew, And while thy willing soul transpires At every pore with instant fires, Now let us sport us while we may; And now, like am'rous birds of prey, Rather at once our time devour, Than languish in his slow-chapp'd power. Let us roll all our strength, and all Our sweetness, up into one ball; And tear our pleasures with rough strife Thorough the iron gates of life. Thus, though we cannot make our sun Stand still, yet we will make him run. -Andrew Marvell

Phenomenal Woman

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.

-Maya Angelou

Ode to the Book

When I close a book
I open life.
I hear
faltering cries
among harbours.
Copper ignots
slide down sand-pits
to Tocopilla.
Night time.
Among the islands
our ocean
throbs with fish,
touches the feet, the thighs,
the chalk ribs
of my country.
The whole of night
clings to its shores, by dawn
it wakes up singing
as if it had excited a guitar.

The ocean's surge is calling.
The wind
calls me
and Rodriguez calls,
and Jose Antonio--
I got a telegram
from the "Mine" Union
and the one I love
(whose name I won't let out)
expects me in Bucalemu.

No book has been able
to wrap me in paper,
to fill me up
with typography,
with heavenly imprints
or was ever able
to bind my eyes,
I come out of books to people orchards
with the hoarse family of my song,
to work the burning metals
or to eat smoked beef
by mountain firesides.
I love adventurous
books,
books of forest or snow,
depth or sky
but hate
the spider book
in which thought
has laid poisonous wires
to trap the juvenile
and circling fly.
Book, let me go.
I won't go clothed
in volumes,
I don't come out
of collected works,
my poems
have not eaten poems--
they devour
exciting happenings,
feed on rough weather,
and dig their food
out of earth and men.
I'm on my way
with dust in my shoes
free of mythology:
send books back to their shelves,
I'm going down into the streets.
I learned about life
from life itself,
love I learned in a single kiss
and could teach no one anything
except that I have lived
with something in common among men,
when fighting with them,
when saying all their say in my song.

-Pablo Neruda, translated by Nathaniel Tarn

Homage to My Hips

these hips are big hips.

they need space to

move around in.

they don't fit into little

petty places. these hips

are free hips.

they don't like to be held back.
these hips have never been enslaved,

they go where they want to go

they do what they want to do.

these hips are mighty hips.

these hips are magic hips.

i have known them

to put a spell on a man and

spin him like a top

Lucille Clifton

Sonnet XVII

I don't love you as if you were the salt-rose, topaz
or arrow of carnations that propagate fire:
I love you as certain dark things are loved,
secretly, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that doesn't bloom and carries
hidden within itself the light of those flowers,
and thanks to your love, darkly in my body
lives the dense fragrance that rises from the earth.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,
I love you simply, without complexities or pride:
I love you in this way because I don't know any other way of loving

but this, in which there is no I or you,
so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand,
so intimate that when I fall asleep it is your eyes that close.

-Pablo Neruda

Mind Without Fear

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;

Where knowledge is free;

Where the world has not been broken up

into fragments by narrow domestic walls;

Where words come out from the depth of truth;

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;

Where the clear stream of reason

has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;

Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action---

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

-Rabindranath Tagore
From Gitanjali

If

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!

-Rudyard Kipling

The Brown Man's Burden

Pile on the brown man's burden
To gratify your greed;
Go, clear away the "niggers"
Who progress would impede;
Be very stern, for truly
'Tis useless to be mild
With new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half devil and half child.

Pile on the brown man's burden;
And, if ye rouse his hate,
Meet his old-fashioned reasons
With Maxims up to date.
With shells and dumdum bullets
A hundred times made plain
The brown man's loss must ever
Imply the white man's gain.

Pile on the brown man's burden,
compel him to be free;
Let all your manifestoes
Reek with philanthropy.
And if with heathen folly
He dares your will dispute,
Then, in the name of freedom,
Don't hesitate to shoot.

Pile on the brown man's burden,
And if his cry be sore,
That surely need not irk you--
Ye've driven slaves before.
Seize on his ports and pastures,
The fields his people tread;
Go make from them your living,
And mark them with his dead.

Pile on the brown man's burden,
And through the world proclaim
That ye are Freedom's agent--
There's no more paying game!
And, should your own past history
Straight in your teeth be thrown,
Retort that independence
Is good for whites alone.

-By Henry Labouchère


*poster's note: this is the response to the white man's burden etc.

The White Man's Burden

Take up the White Man’s burden—

Send forth the best ye breed—

Go send your sons to exile

To serve your captives' need

To wait in heavy harness

On fluttered folk and wild—

Your new-caught, sullen peoples,

Half devil and half child

Take up the White Man’s burden

In patience to abide

To veil the threat of terror

And check the show of pride;

By open speech and simple

An hundred times made plain

To seek another’s profit

And work another’s gain

Take up the White Man’s burden—

And reap his old reward:

The blame of those ye better

The hate of those ye guard—

The cry of hosts ye humour

(Ah slowly) to the light:

"Why brought ye us from bondage,

“Our loved Egyptian night?”

Take up the White Man’s burden-

Have done with childish days-

The lightly proffered laurel,

The easy, ungrudged praise.

Comes now, to search your manhood

Through all the thankless years,

Cold-edged with dear-bought wisdom,

The judgment of your peers!

-rudyard kipling

Mr. BOOM BOOM Man

Here he comes!

Distorted bass

nearly three blocks away

I wait

at the mercy of the traffic light

waitin

n waitin

for it to change

from red to green

so I won't have to deal

with him . . .

Mr. BOOM BOOM Man.

But my rearview mirror

it doesn't lie

n pumping his system

from my behind

I see his calling card

baby lavender twinkle lights

hugging a chrome-plated license plate

five-digit proclamation:

Double O Bad

coming at me!

A fifty-pound medallion

heaving a hickey-stained neck

closer

to the center of his manhood:

his beeper.

He pulls up slowly . . .

lowered Nissan mini truck

fills the vacancy on my left

n as the automatic tinted window

makes it slow way down,

I start to wonder

Why,

why can't I be like the cool girls

and like the cars that go:

BOOM BA BOOM . . . ?

Dig the way quarters

bounce off vinyl roofs?

Funky, fresh and stoopid

they say.

But then a flash

of gold gilded teeth

blinds my thoughts

n Mr. BOOM BOOM

shouts out:

Hey!

Sen-yo-reeeeta!

mamacita!

You speak English?

Hey . . . YOU

I'm talkin' to you . . .

aaah, you deaf bitch!

And then

I remember.

I wanna yell out,

Yeah, I speak English,

Pig Latin too

so Uckfay Offay

Mr. BOOM BOOM

Take your fade

n f-f-fade away!

But the light has turned green

n I don't have the time

(or the balls, really)

I take off

FAST

leaving behind

Mr. BOOM BOOM

Bu-foon.

-Michele Serros

She dwelt among the untrodden ways

She dwelt among the untrodden ways

Beside the springs of Dove,

A maid whom there were none to praise

And very few to love:

A violet by a mossy stone

Half hidden from the eye!

-- Fair as a star, when only one

Is shining in the sky.

She lived unknown, and few could know

When Lucy ceased to be;

But she is in her grave, and, oh,

The difference to me!

-William Wordsworth

Reminiscence

There are times when I’ll dream in black and white
And remember the good times that we shared
But, now I fear the coming of the night
Because I am so very ill prepared.

Days will pass by, and wounds will start to heal
Alas all ground is lost with things I hear
For that is all it takes for scabs to peel
Unexpected from whom I once held near.

They say you never get over first love
And I believe that this is very true
Memories with you stay white like a dove
But for now I’ll sit here, a little blue

Even though I had given up on us
Never forget what we had - that’s a must

Votive

O Moon, swung there immeasurably far,

Yet only in the pear-tree top, how then

Shall we body in thought the beauty that you are ---

Your wizardry upon the souls of men?

Hush? Let us say it is the tender light

That falls in silver circumstance and red

Dimly upon the regions of the night,

And saying this how little then is said.

Why should this mute enchantment thus possess

Our hearts in adoration -- how should come

This worship of a ghost of quietness,

Of spectral tides that move not and are dumb?

Why do we worship? We are but strays of will,

While the sun takes us. Folded now and far

From the day's light, we are minds possessed and still,

Vision and peace. We worship what we are.

-John Drinkwater

Mole

Tunnelled in solid blackness creeps

The old mole-soul, and wakes or sleeps

He knows not which, but tunnels on

Through ages of oblivion;

Until at last the long constraint

Of each-hand wall is lost, and faint

Comes daylight creeping from afar,

And mole-work grows crepuscular.

Tunnel meets air and bursts; mole sees

Men hugely walking . . . or are they trees?

And far horizons smoking blue,

And chasing clouds for ever new;

Green hills, like lighted lamps aglow

Or quenching 'neath the cloud-shadow;

Quenching and blazing turn by turn,

Spring's great green signals fitfully burn.

Mole travels on, but finds the steering

A harder task of pioneering

Than when he thridded through the strait

Blind catacombs that ancient fate

Had carved for him. Stupid and dumb

And blind and touchless he had come

A way without a turn; but here,

Under the sky, the passenger

Chooses his own best way; and mole

Distracted wanders, yet his hole

Regrets not much wherein he crept,

But runs, a joyous nympholept,

This way and that, by all made mad -----

River nymph and oread,

Ocean's daughters and Lorelei,

Combing the silken mystery,

The glaucous gold of her rivery tresses -----

Each haunts the traveller, each possesses

The drunken wavering soul awhile;

Then with a phantom's cock-crow smile

Mocks craving with sheer vanishment.

Mole-eyes grow hawk's: knowledge is lent

In grudging driblets that pay high,

Unconscionable usury

To unrelenting life, Mole learns

To travel more secure; the turns

Of his long way less puzzling seem,

And all those magic forms that gleam

In airy invitation cheat

Less often than they did of old.

The earth slopes upward, fold on fold

Of quiet hills that meet the gold

Serenity of western skies.

Over the world's edge with clear eyes

Our mole transcendent sees his way

Tunnelled in light : he must obey

Necessity again and thrid

Close catacombs as erst he did,

Fate's tunnellings, himself must bore

Thorough the sunset's inmost core.

The guiding walls to each-hand shine

Luminous and crystalline;

And mole shall tunnel on and on,

Till night let fall oblivion.

-A. L. Huxley

Tanka

autumn. a bonfire

of leaves. morning peels us toward

pomegranate festivals.

and in the evening i bring

you soup cooled by my laughter.

-Sonia Sanchez

Blues

will you love me baby when the sun goes down

i say will you love me baby when the sun goes down

or you just a summertime man leaving fo winter comes round.

will you keep me baby when i'm feeling down 'n' out

i say will you hold me baby when i'm feeling down 'n' out

or will you just stop & spit while i lives from hand to mouth.

done drunk so much of you i staggers in my sleep

i say done drunk so much of you man, i staggers in my sleep

when i wakes up baby, gonna start me on a brand new week.

will you love me baby when the sun goes down

i say will you love me baby when the sun goes down

or you just a summertime man leaving fo winter comes round.

-Sonia Sanchez

713

sitting in this room
we will chill and listen to
music for good times.

Upon Westminster Bridge

Earth has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth like a garment wear

The beauty of the morning: silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky,
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.

Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!

The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!

-William Wordsworth