Blank Joy

[melodily.livejournal.com]

She who did not come, wasn't she determined
nonetheless to organize and decorate my heart?
If we had to exist to become the one we love,
what would the heart have to create?

Lovely joy left blank, perhaps you are
the center of all my labors and my loves.
If I've wept for you so much, it's because
I preferred you among so many outlined joys.

Rainer Maria Rilke, trans. A. Poulin Jr.

debate and a poem.

[meandyouyouyou.livejournal.com]

there's an interesting series that is starting at the poetryfoundation.org website, talking about the "tension" between the academy and slam poetry. i know this can be a devisive issue for some, but i find it interesting to talk about. here's a link to the first part: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/features/feature.onpoetry.html?id=179688

and now a poem.

Scenes From the Battle of Us
by Cate Marvin

You are like a war novel, entirely lacking
female characters, except for an occasional
letter that makes one of the men cry.

I am like a table
that eats its own legs off
because it’s fallen
in love with the floor.

My frantic hand can’t find where my leg
went. You can play the tourniquet. A tree
with white limbs will grow here someday.

Or maybe a pup tent
that’s collapsed in on itself,
it so loves the sleep
of men sleeping beneath it.

The reason why women dislike war movies
may have something to do with why men hate
romantic comedies: they are both about war.

Perhaps I should
live in a pig’s trough.
There, I’d be wanted.
There, I’d be tasted.

When the mail bag drops from the sky
and lands heavy on the jungle floor, its letters
are prepared to swim away with your tears.

One letter reads:
I can barely feel
furtive. The other:
I am diminishing.