April 2013
3 posts
Instants - Jorge Luis Borges
If I could live again my life, In the next - I’ll try, - to make more mistakes, I won’t try to be so perfect, I’ll be more relaxed, I’ll be more full - than I am now, In fact, I’ll take fewer things seriously, I’ll be less hygenic, I’ll take more risks, I’ll take more trips, I’ll watch more sunsets, I’ll climb more mountains, I’ll swim more rivers, I’ll go to more places - I’ve never been, I’ll...
Extract from The Ballad Of Reading Gaol - Oscar...
The man had killed the thing he loved And so he had to die. Yet each man kills the thing he loves By each let this be heard, Some do it with a bitter look, Some with a flattering word, The coward does it with a kiss, The brave man with a sword!
Some kill their love when they are young, And some when they are old; Some strangle with the hands of Lust, Some with the hands of Gold: The...
Carpe Diem, Youth
Carpe diem, carpe diem, How, but how? Words in a row, Sunshine in the shutters, Carpe diem, carpe diem, How, but how? A forbidden springtime, Daylight on the padlock, Carpe diem, seize the day, I don’t know the way, My generation In a quartet ash-grey.
March 2013
1 post
For the White poets who would be Indian - Wendy...
just once just long enough to snap up the words fish-hooked from our tongues. You think of us now when you kneel on the earth, turn holy in a temporary tourism of our souls.
With words you paint your faces. chew your doeskin, touch breast to tree as if sharing a mother were all it takes, could bring instant and primal knowledge. You think of us only when your voices want for roots, when you have...
February 2013
5 posts
“Everyone discusses my art and pretends to understand, as if it were necessary to understand, when it is simply necessary to love.”
— Monet
“If you know that I am an unbeliever, then you know me better than I do myself. I may be an unbeliever, but I am an unbeliever who has a nostalgia for a belief.” — Pier Paolo Pasolini
“The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes “Awww!”
— Jack Kerouac, On the Road
Pa forme eshte qielli,si tru idioti. Merzitshem trotuaret shiu i qull. Nje kalimtar,nje ombrelle,gjemon moti. Nje biciklete kthesen merr me vrull.
Pa forme eshte qielli,si nje mendim idioti.
Fall in Tirana Without form is the sky, like a brain of an idiot.
Annoyingly the rain soaks pavements.
A passerby, an umbrella, weather thunders.
A bicycle takes a turn with momentum. Without...
January 2013
3 posts
“No written word, no spoken plea Can teach our youth what they should be, Nor all the books on all the shelves. It’s what the teachers are themselves.”
December 2012
1 post
Mock on, mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau - William...
Mock on, mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau; Mock on, mock on; ‘tis all in vain! You throw the sand against the wind, And the wind blows it back again. And every sand becomes a gem Reflected in the beams divine; Blown back they blind the mocking eye, But still in Israel’s paths they shine. The Atoms of Democritus And Newton’s Particles of Light Are sands upon the Red Sea shore, Where Israel’s tents do...
September 2012
1 post
Ask the artist. Ask the poet. Ask the scientist. Ask the inventor or the philosopher: are the clouds lonely or angry?!
July 2012
9 posts
Goodbye My Love, goodbye - Anon
Fire runs through my body with the pain of loving you
Pain runs through my body with the fires of my love for you
Sickness wanders my body with my love for you
Pain like a boil about to burst with my love for you
Consumed by the fire with my love for you
I remember what you said to me
I am thinking of your love for me
I am torn by your love for me
Pain and more pain
Where are you going...
Richard Cory - Edwin Arlington Robinson
Whenever Richard Cory went down town, We people on the pavement looked at him: He was a gentleman from sole to crown, Clean favored, and imperially slim. And he was always quietly arrayed, And he was always human when he talked; But still he fluttered pulses when he said, ‘Good-morning,’ and he glittered when he walked. And he was rich - yes, richer than a king - And admirably...
My Papa's Waltz - Theodore Roethke
The whiskey on your breath Could make a small boy dizzy; But I hung on like death: Such waltzing was not easy. We romped until the pans Slid from the kitchen shelf; My mother’s countenance Could not unfrown itself. The hand that held my wrist Was battered on one knuckle; At every step you missed My right ear scraped a buckle. You beat time on my head With a palm caked hard by...
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening - Robert...
Whose woods these are I think I know. His house is in the village, though; He will not see me stopping here To watch his woods fill up with snow. My little horse must think it queer To stop without a farmhouse near Between the woods and frozen lake The darkest evening of the year. He gives his harness bells a shake To ask if there is some mistake. The only other sound’s the sweep Of easy...
I Like For You To Be Still - Pablo Neruda
I like for you to be still It is as though you are absent And you hear me from far away And my voice does not touch you It seems as though your eyes had flown away And it seems that a kiss had sealed your mouth As all things are filled with my soul You emerge from the things Filled with my soul You are like my soul A butterfly of dream And you are like the word: Melancholy I like for you to be...
Walking Around - Pablo Neruda
It so happens I am sick of being a man. And it happens that I walk into tailorshops and movie houses dried up, waterproof, like a swan made of felt steering my way in a water of wombs and ashes. The smell of barbershops makes me break into hoarse sobs. The only thing I want is to lie still like stones or wool. The only thing I want is to see no more stores, no gardens, no more goods, no...
I Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You -...
I do not love you except because I love you; I go from loving to not loving you, From waiting to not waiting for you My heart moves from cold to fire. I love you only because it’s you the one I love; I hate you deeply, and hating you Bend to you, and the measure of my changing love for you Is that I do not see you but love you blindly. Maybe January light will consume My heart with its cruel...
XVII (I do not love you...) - Pablo Neruda
I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz, or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off. I love you as certain dark things are to be loved, in secret, between the shadow and the soul. I love you as the plant that never blooms but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers; thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance, risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body. I love you...
If You Forget Me - Pablo Neruda
I want you to know one thing. You know how this is: if I look at the crystal moon, at the red branch of the slow autumn at my window, if I touch near the fire the impalpable ash or the wrinkled body of the log, everything carries me to you, as if everything that exists, aromas, light, metals, were little boats that sail toward those isles of yours that wait for me. Well, now, if little by little...
June 2012
4 posts
Aching of life - Shinkichi Takahashi
There must be something better,
But i’m satisfied just as i am.
-
Monkeys sport deep in the forest,
Fish shoot up the mountain stream.
-
If there’s change, there’s also repose-
which soon must suffer change.
-
Along the solar orbit of the night,
i feel life’s constant aching:
-
Smack in the middle of the day,
I found moonlight between a woman’s legs
Time - Shinkichi Takahashi
Time like a lake breeze
Touched his face,
All though left his mind.
-
One morning the sun, menacing,
Rose from behind a mountain,
Singeing-like hope-the trees,
-
Fully awakened, he lit his pipe
And assumed the sun-inhaling pose:
Time poured down-like rain, like fruit.
-
He glanced back and saw a ship
Moving towards the past. In one hand
He griped the sail of eternity,
-
And...
Enlightenment Unfolds, Edited by Kazuaki...
The whole universe
shatters into a hundred pieces. In the great death there is no heaven, no earth.
Once body and mind have turned over there is only this to say:
Past mind cannot be grasped, present mind cannot be grasped, future mind cannot be grasped.
Great Doubt, Great Awakening, Little Doubt, Little Awakening, No Doubt, No Awakening.
April 2012
1 post
Silentium! - Fyodor Tyutchev
Speak not, lie hidden, and conceal
the way you dream, the things you feel.
Deep in your spirit let them rise
akin to stars in crystal skies
that set before the night is blurred:
delight in them and speak no word.
-
How can a heart expression find?
How should another know your mind?
Will he discern what quickens you?
A thought, once uttered, is untrue.
Dimmed is the fountainhead when...
March 2012
1 post
Tadpole's Promise by Tony Ross & Jeanne Willis
Where the willow meets the water a tadpole met a caterpillar. They gazed into each other’s tiny eyes … and fell in love. She was his beautiful rainbow, and he was her shiny black pearl. “I love everything about you,” said the tadpole. “I love everything about you,” said the caterpillar. “Promise you’ll never change.” “I promise,” he...
February 2012
11 posts
Ikja e moisi Golemit - Ismail Kadare
Kjo ruga perdridhet si gjarper i zi per ku po vrapon gjeneral Moisi? Pelerinen era ta ngre me tallaz gjeneral Moisi pluhur shume le pas. Kali perpin udhet muzgu bie ngadal pse te dridhet freri dores gjeneral? Leshrat gjithe pluhur te godasin syte mbi boshllek te tyre balli i ftohte i yt. Nata zbret mbi udhet larg zjare cobenjsh gjeneral Moisi perse shpaten zhvesh? Udha eshte e gjate tutje teri...
Always - Pablo Neruda
I am not jealous of what came before me. Come with a man on your shoulders, come with a hundred men in your hair, come with a thousand men between your breasts and your feet, come like a river full of drowned men which flows down to the wild sea, to the eternal surf, to Time! Bring them all to where I am waiting for you; we shall always be alone, we shall always be you and I alone on earth, to...
Tonight I Can Write The Saddest Lines - Pablo...
Tonight I can write the saddest lines. Write, for example,’The night is shattered and the blue stars shiver in the distance.’ The night wind revolves in the sky and sings. Tonight I can write the saddest lines. I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too. Through nights like this one I held her in my arms I kissed her again and again under the endless sky. She loved me sometimes, and I...
O Me! O Life! - Walt Whitman
O Me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring;
Of the endless trains of the faithless—of cities fill’d with the foolish;
Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)
Of eyes that vainly crave the light—of the objects mean—of the struggle ever renew’d;
Of the poor results of all—of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me; ...
If— - Rudyard Kipling
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...
I Have News for You - Tony Hoagland
There are people who do not see a broken playground swing
as a symbol of ruined childhood
and there are people who don't interpret the behavior
of a fly in a motel room as a mocking representation of their thought process.
There are people who don't walk past an empty swimming pool
and think about past pleasures unrecoverable
and then stand there blocking the sidewalk for other...
We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not...
We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not breaths;
In feelings, not in figures on a dial.
We should count time by heart-throbs. He most lives
Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best.
And he whose heart beats quickest lives the longest:
Lives in one hour more than in years do some
Whose fat blood sleeps as it slips along their veins.
Life's but a means unto an end; that end,...
Dream - Langston Hughes
Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.
Days - Ralph Waldo Emerson
Daughters of Time, the hypocritic Days,
Muffled and dumb like barefoot dervishes,
And marching single in an endless file,
Bring diadems and fagots in their hands.
To each they offer gifts after his will,
Bread, kingdom, stars, and sky that holds them all.
I, in my pleached garden, watched the pomp,
Forgot my morning wishes, hastily
Took a few herbs and apples, and the Day
Turned and departed...
Carpe Diem - Robert Frost
Age saw two quiet children
Go loving by at twilight,
He knew not whether homeward,
Or outward from the village,
Or (chimes were ringing) churchward,
He waited (they were strangers)
Till they were out of hearing
To bid them both be happy.
"Be happy, happy, happy,
And seize the day of pleasure."
The age-long theme is Age's.
'Twas Age imposed on poems
Their gather-roses burden
To warn...
First Fig - Edna St. Vincent Millay
My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It gives a lovely light!
January 2012
4 posts
The Cynic's Monologue - Dritëro AGOLLI
I loved you, I love you no longer! Worse can happen in life. There are those who remain lovers until they grow old, There are those who are lovers for but a month. I loved you, I love you no longer! You were born to suffer, so suffer! I am an honest man, I respect the...
Daddy What If? - Shel Silverstein,
“(Daddy what if the sun stop shinin’ what would happen then?) If the sun stopped shinin’ you’d be so surprised You’d stare at the heavens with wide open eyes And the wind would carry your light to the skies And the sun would start shinin’ again (Daddy what if the wind stopped blowin’ what would happen then?) If the wind stopped blowin’ then the land would be dry And your boat wouldn’t sail...
I Shall Paint My Nails Red - Carole Satyamurti
because a bit of a colour is a public service because I am proud of my hands. because it will remind me I’m a woman. because I will look like a survivor. because I can admire them in traffic jams because my daughter will say ugh. because my lover will be surprised. because it is quicker than dyeing my hair. because it is a ten-minute moratorium. because it is reversible.
Buffalo Bill's - E. E .Cummings
defunct
who used to
ride a watersmooth-silver
stallion
and break onetwothreefourfive pigeonsjustlikethat
Jesus
he was a handsome man
and what i want to know is
how do you like your blueeyed boy
Mister Death
December 2011
8 posts
Silent Worship- Handel
Did you not hear My Lady Go down the garden singing Blackbird and thrush were silent To hear the alleys ringing… Oh saw you not My Lady Out in the garden there Shaming the rose and lily For she is twice as fair. Though I am nothing to her Though she must rarely look at me And though I could never woo her I love her till I die. Surely you heard My Lady Go down the garden...
Fire and Ice - Robert Frost
Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in ice. From what I’ve tasted of desire I hold with those who favor fire. But if it had to perish twice, I think I know enough of hate To say that for destruction ice Is also great And would suffice.
The More Loving One - W. H. Auden
Looking up at the stars, I know quite well That, for all they care, I can go to hell, But on earth indifference is the least We have to dread from man or beast.
How should we like it were stars to burn With a passion for us we could not return? If equal affection cannot be, Let the more loving one be me.
Admirer as I think I am Of stars that do not give a damn, I cannot, now I see them,...
Nothing Gold Can Stay - Robert Frost
Nature’s first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf’s a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay.
