A Poetry Thread

[donbosco]

Go Heels!!!

"I Am Waiting.
I am waiting for my case to come up
and I am waiting
for a rebirth of wonder
and I am waiting for someone
to really discover America
and wail
and I am waiting
for the discovery
of a new symbolic western frontier
and I am waiting
for the American Eagle
to really spread its wings
and straighten up and fly right
and I am waiting
for the Age of Anxiety
to drop dead
and I am waiting
for the war to be fought
which will make the world safe
for anarchy
and I am waiting
for the final withering away
of all governments
and I am perpetually awaiting
a rebirth of wonder
I am waiting for the Second Coming
and I am waiting
for a religious revival
to sweep thru the state of Arizona
and I am waiting
for the Grapes of Wrath to be stored
and I am waiting
for them to prove
that God is really American
and I am waiting
to see God on television
piped onto church altars
if only they can find
the right channel
to tune in on
and I am waiting
for the Last Supper to be served again
with a strange new appetizer
and I am perpetually awaiting
a rebirth of wonder
I am waiting for my number to be called
and I am waiting
for the Salvation Army to take over
and I am waiting
for the meek to be blessed
and inherit the earth
without taxes
and I am waiting
for forests and animals
to reclaim the earth as theirs
and I am waiting
for a way to be devised
to destroy all nationalisms
without killing anybody
and I am waiting
for linnets and planets to fall like rain
and I am waiting for lovers and weepers
to lie down together again
in a new rebirth of wonder
I am waiting for the Great Divide to be crossed
and I am anxiously waiting
for the secret of eternal life to be discovered
by an obscure general practitioner
and I am waiting
for the storms of life
to be over
and I am waiting
to set sail for happiness
and I am waiting
for a reconstructed Mayflower
to reach America
with its picture story and tv rights
sold in advance to the natives
and I am waiting
for the lost music to sound again
in the Lost Continent
in a new rebirth of wonder
I am waiting for the day
that maketh all things clear
and I am awaiting retribution
for what America did
to Tom Sawyer
and I am waiting
for Alice in Wonderland
to retransmit to me
her total dream of innocence
and I am waiting
for Childe Roland to come
to the final darkest tower
and I am waiting
for Aphrodite
to grow live arms
at a final disarmament conference
in a new rebirth of wonder
I am waiting
to get some intimations
of immortality
by recollecting my early childhood
and I am waiting
for the green mornings to come again
youth’s dumb green fields come back again
and I am waiting
for some strains of unpremeditated art
to shake my typewriter
and I am waiting to write
the great indelible poem
and I am waiting
for the last long careless rapture
and I am perpetually waiting
for the fleeing lovers on the Grecian Urn
to catch each other up at last
and embrace
and I am awaiting
perpetually and forever
a renaissance of wonder"

~Lawrence Ferlinghetti

PS Ferlinghetti passed away on this date in 2021. He was 101 years old.

 

[donbosco]

MEMORIAL HOOPS by Reginald Dwayne Betts.

The day broke a record for cold, for us wanting
To be anywhere but outside, & it was late
May, the weekend we called Memorial. My mother
Is a veteran, but that is a story for another time,
& we were driving into the mother of rivers state,
My youngest son, named after two men, one who
Turned a trumpet into a prayer, the other who
Before a piano became whatever those who know say
G-d sounds like, me, & friends, who like me, imagined
Watching their sons trade baskets with strangers
Was some kind of holy. Around us was more granite
Than Black folks & I carried Primo Levi’s If This Is a Man
In my knapsack, hesitant to return to all the astonishing
Ways we make each other suffer &, still, somehow,
Survive, & astonished most by how we remember. I’ve
Forgotten my fair share of things that matter. But
Who am I kidding? The weekend was about
Basketball. We’d driven three hours to this colder
Weather. My youngest boy hoped he’d heat up once
A ball touched his hands. Did I say we named the child
After the idiosyncrasies of Jazz, all because as children
I don’t think my wife & I knew enough ambition
To save us from what we’d encounter. These were the days
When he and the nine he suited up with desired
Little more than to hear the rasp of a ball against whatever
Passed for wood in a gym with a hoop. There is something
To be said about how basketball makes men of boys and boys
Of men. The ref who chattered with us parents wondered
Why a cousin the age of the ballers ate chips for breakfast.
The other team had a player who made me think, though
She be but little she is fierce, as she, the only girl on
The court slipped a jewel into that hovering crown
We cheered, even those of us whose boys sought to dribble
& jump shot their way to the glory of a win. & when Miles
Came down as if he knew what would happen. I didn’t hold
My breath. A crossover, the ball then swung around his back,
The kid before him lost on some raft in a wild river. Maybe
He knew the ball would fall true because he turned around
To watch us as much as to get back on defense. We laughed
& laughed & watched as kids barely large enough to launch
all of that need at a target did so, again & again.

 

[donbosco]

My youngest boy hoped he’d heat up once
A ball touched his hands. Did I say we named the child
After the idiosyncrasies of Jazz, all because as children
I don’t think my wife & I knew enough ambition
To save us from what we’d encounter. These were the days
When he and the nine he suited up with desired
Little more than to hear the rasp of a ball against whatever
Passed for wood in a gym with a hoop. There is something
To be said about how basketball makes men of boys and boys
Of men. The ref who chattered with us parents wondered
Why a cousin the age of the ballers ate chips for breakfast.
The other team had a player who made me think, though
She be but little she is fierce, as she, the only girl on
The court slipped a jewel into that hovering crown
We cheered, even those of us whose boys sought to dribble
& jump shot their way to the glory of a win. & when Miles
Came down as if he knew what would happen. I didn’t hold
My breath. A crossover, the ball then swung around his back,
The kid before him lost on some raft in a wild river. Maybe
He knew the ball would fall true because he turned around
To watch us as much as to get back on defense. We laughed
& laughed & watched as kids barely large enough to launch
all of that need at a target did so, again & again.

 

[donbosco]

For the Anniversary of My Death​

By W. S. Merwin
Every year without knowing it I have passed the day
When the last fires will wave to me
And the silence will set out
Tireless traveler
Like the beam of a lightless star

Then I will no longer
Find myself in life as in a strange garment
Surprised at the earth
And the love of one woman
And the shamelessness of men
As today writing after three days of rain
Hearing the wren sing and the falling cease
And bowing not knowing to what

 

[donbosco]

“The world is a beautiful place”​

Lawrence Ferlinghetti
1919 –2021
The world is a beautiful place
to be born into
if you don’t mind happiness
not always being
so very much fun
if you don’t mind a touch of hell
now and then
just when everything is fine
because even in heaven
they don’t sing
all the time

The world is a beautiful place
to be born into
if you don’t mind some people dying
all the time
or maybe only starving
some of the time
which isn’t half so bad
if it isn’t you

Oh the world is a beautiful place
to be born into
if you don’t much mind
a few dead minds
in the higher places
or a bomb or two
now and then
in your upturned faces
or such other improprieties
as our Name Brand society
is prey to
with its men of distinction
and its men of extinction
and its priests
and other patrolmen
and its various segregations
and congressional investigations
and other constipations
that our fool flesh
is heir to

Yes the world is the best place of all
for a lot of such things as
making the fun scene
and making the love scene
and making the sad scene
and singing low songs of having
inspirations
and walking around
looking at everything
and smelling flowers
and goosing statues
and even thinking
and kissing people and
making babies and wearing pants
and waving hats and
dancing
and going swimming in rivers
on picnics
in the middle of the summer
and just generally
‘living it up’

Yes
but then right in the middle of it
comes the smiling
mortician

 

[Ddseddse]

Dora, sitting enthroned, said: '‘Doc, play some of that
nice music. I get Christ awful sick of that musical box over
home.'’

Then Doc played Ardo and the Amor from an album of
Monteverdi. And the guests sat quietly and their eyes were
inward, Dora breathed beauty. Two newcomers crept up
the stairs and entered quietly. Doc was feeling a golden
pleasant sadness. The guests were silent when the music
stopped. Doc brought out a book and he read in a clear,
deep voice:

Even now

If I see in my soul the citron-breasted fair one
Still gold-tinted, her face like our night stars,

Drawing unto her; her body beaten about with flame,
Wounded by the flaring spear of love,

My first of all by reason of her fresh years,

Then is my heart buried alive in snow.

Even now

If my girl with lotus eyes came to me again
Weary with the dear weight of young love,

Again I would give her to these starved twins of arms
And from her mouth drink down the heavy wine,

As a reeling pirate bee in fluttered ease
Steals up the honey from the nenuphar.

Even now

If I saw her lying all wide eyes
And with collyrium the indent of her cheek
Lengthened to the bright ear and her pale side
So suffering the fever of my distance,

Then would my love for her be ropes of flowers, and
night

A black-haired lover on the breasts of day.

Even now

My eyes that hurry to see no more are painting, painting

Faces of my lost girl. O golden rings

That tap against cheeks of small magnolia-leaves,

0 whitest so soft parchment where

My poor divorced lips have written excellent
Stanzas of kisses, and will write no more.

Even now

Death sends me the flickering of powdery lids
Over wild eyes and the pity of her slim body
All broken up with the weariness of joy;

The little red flowers of her breasts to be my comfort
Moving above scarves, and for my sorrow
Wet crimson lips that once I marked as mine.

Even now

They chatter her weakness through the two bazaars
Wlio was so strong to love me. And small men
That buy and sell for silver being slaves
Crinkles the fat about their eyes; and yet
No Prince of the Cities of the Sea has taken her,
Leading to his grim bed. Little lonely one.

You cling to me as a garment clings; my girl.

Even now

I love long black eyes that caress like silk.

Ever and ever sad and laughing eyes,

Whose lids make such sweet shadow when they close
It seems another beautiful look of hers.

I love a fresh mouth, ah, a scented mouth.

And curving hair, subtle as a smoke.

And light fingers, and laughter of green gems.

Even now

I remember that you made answer very softly,

We being one soul, your hand on my hair,

The burning memory rounding your near lips;

I have seen the priestesses of Rati make love at moon fall
And then in a carpeted hall with a bright gold lamp
Lie down carelessly anywhere to sleep.**^

♦ “Black Marigolds,” translated from the Sanskrit by E. Powys Mathers.


Phyllis Mac was openly weeping when he stopped and
Dora herself dabbed at her eyes. Hazel was so taken by
the sound of the words that he had not listened to their
meaning. But a little world sadness had slipped over all
of them. Everyone was remembering a lost love, everyone a
call.

Mack said: ‘‘Jesus, that’s pretty. Reminds me of a
dame ” and he let it pass. They filled the wineglasses
and became quiet. The party was slipping away in sweet
sadness. Eddie went out in the office and did a little tap-
dance and came back and sat down again. The party was
about to recline and go to sleep when there was a tramp of
feet on the stairs. A great voice shouted; ''Where’s the
girls?”

Mack got up almost happily and crossed quickly to the
door. And a smile of joy illuminated the faces of Hughie
and Jones. "What girls you got in mind?” Mack asked
softly.

"Ain’t this a whore-house? Cab-driver said they was one
down here.”

"You made a mistake, Mister.” Mack’s voice was gay.

"Well, what’s them dames in there?”

They joined battle then. They were the crew of a San
Pedro tuna-boat, good, hard, happy, fight-wise men. With
the first rush they burst through to the party. Dora’s girls
had each one slipped off a shoe and held it by the toe. As
the fight raged by they would clip a man on the head with
the spike heel. Dora leaped for the kitchen and came roar-
ing out with a meat grinder. Even Doc was happy. He
flailed about with the Chalmers 1916 piston and connect-
ing-rod.