Two by Dan Bellm

[arielblue.livejournal.com]

Both of these are from Dan Bellm's book One Hand on the Wheel (The Roundhouse Press, 1999).

Hands

Here, scarred over nicely, is where the tip was sawed away -- Working
yourself down to bone there were bound to be accidents
in the tender places -- Here, the thumb of your right hand
got reattached, but at a slant: I like to imagine I feel
a lost tenderness coming to you again
as the tension drains from your fingers -- I mean, the life -- the two of us holding

( Read more... )

Consolation

Et expecto resurrectionem mortuorum,
et vitam venturi saeculi.

After I kiss his forehead lightly once
goodbye,

after the closing of the box,

where does his suffering go --
of course it's the Catholic heaven
he expects, the resurrection of the body
and the life of the world to come

but where does his suffering go --

I mean whatever of it
that is not part of me --

( Read more... )

From The Black Riders and Other Lines [1895] ...

[ashcanprobably.livejournal.com]

3.

In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
Who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, "Is it good, friend?"
"It is bitter – bitter", he answered,
"But I like it
Because it is bitter,
And because it is my heart."

Stephen Crane

Obit // Robert Lowell

[iatrogenicmyth.livejournal.com]

Our love will not come back on fortune's wheel -

in the end it gets us, though a man know what he'd have:
old scars, old money, old undebased pre-Lyndon
silver, no copper rubbing through ... old wives;
I could live such a too long time with mine.
In the end, every hypochondriac is his own prophet.
Before the final coming to rest, comes the rest
of all transcendence in a mode of being, hushing
all becoming. I'm for and with myself in my otherness,
in the eternal return of earth's fairer children,
the lily, the rose, the sun on brick at dusk,
the loved, the lover, and their fear of life,
their unconquered flux, insensate oneness, painful "It was ..."
After loving you so much, can I forget
you for eternity and have no other choice?

To the Young Who Want to Die

[i-hunger.livejournal.com]

To the Young Who Want to Die:
Gwendolyn Brooks

Sit down. Inhale. Exhale.
The gun will wait. The lake will wait.
The tall gall in the small seductive vial
will wait will wait:
will wait a week: will wait through April.
You do not have to die this certain day.
Death will abide, will pamper your postponement.
I assure you death will wait. Death has
a lot of time. Death can
attend to you tomorrow. Or next week. Death is
just down the street; is most obliging neighbor;
can meet you any moment.

You need not die today.
Stay here--through pout or pain or peskyness.
Stay here. See what the news is going to be tomorrow.

Graves grow no green that you can use.
Remember, green's your color. You are Spring.

Charles Simic, "Late Call"

[the-grynne.livejournal.com]

A poem from your new PLOTUS.


LATE CALL

A message for you,
Piece of shit:

You double-crossed us.
You were supposed to get yourself
Crucified
For the sake of Truth...

Who, me?

A mere crumb, thankfully,
Overlooked on a dinner table,
Lacking in enthusiasm...
An average nobody.

Oh, the worries...

In the dark windowpane
My mouth gutted open.
Aghast.
The panel of judges all black-hooded.

It must be a joke.
A misunderstanding, fellows.
A wrong number, surely?
A slipup?
An erratum?


CHARLES SIMIC