Ex nada

Salir del vientre
Salir del miedo
Salir del nido

Arrancar
Apretar cueva
A toda raja

Vivir escondida
Sin ser oída

Ni vista
Ni oída

No ser
De la tierra
Si no de la nada.

My Father

My father lived a simple life
But he was a man apart
With gentle ways and humble mind
And an understanding heart

He loved and cared for people
Helping those in need.
He strove to make folk happy
For kindness was his creed.

He never aimed for dizzy heights
Of luxury or fame
But where he walked and where he talked
With love he carved his name.

He was like a rock to lean upon
Each problem he would share.
He found his strength in his belief
And in kneeling down in prayer.

He loved his home and lived his life
With fullness to the end
He taught me much I owe him much
A father and a friend.

Death was peace and joy to him
It was no fearful thing,
His faith was simple and sincere
And God alone his king.

The Old Man's Complaints. And how he gained them

You are old, Father William, the young man cried,
The few locks which are left you are grey;
You are hale, Father William, a hearty old man,
Now tell me the reason I pray.

In the days of my youth, Father William replied,
I remember'd that youth would fly fast,
And abused not my health and my vigour at first
That I never might need them at last.

You are old, Father William, the young man cried,
And pleasures with youth pass away,
And yet you lament not the days that are gone,
Now tell me the reason I pray.

In the days of my youth, Father William replied,
I remember'd that youth could not last;
I thought of the future whatever I did,
That I never might grieve for the past.

You are old, Father William, the young man cried,
And life must be hastening away;
You are chearful, and love to converse upon death!
Now tell me the reason I pray.

I am chearful, young man, Father William replied,
Let the cause thy attention engage;
In the days of my youth I remember'd my God!
And He hath not forgotten my age.

Ocean of Earth

  To G. de Chirico

I have built a house in the middle of the Ocean
Its windows are the rivers flowing from my eyes
Octopi are crawling all over where the walls are
Hear their triple hearts beat and their beaks peck against 
the windowpanes

   House of dampness
   House of burning
   Season’s fastness
   Season singing
  The airplanes are laying eggs
  Watch out for the dropping of the anchor

Watch out for the shooting black ichor
It would be good if you were to come from the sky
The sky’s honeysuckle is climbing
The earthly octopi are throbbing
And so very many of us have become our own gravediggers
Pale octopi of the chalky waves O octopi with pale beaks
Around the house is this ocean that you know well
  And is never still

Pagan Passion

I am sweetly perplexed by love sallies, releases,
By the countless retreats and the numberless captures,
By the petulant coldness and agreeable raptures,
By the whisper of phrases that hurts and then pleases,
I am drunk by the prodigal total of leases
From her body and spirit, her soul and her senses,
I revel in approaches and artless offenses,
In her challenging taunts and her tenderly teases.
Now will I disengage a red flower from her tresses,
And uplift her lithe form from a divan of roses,
For the zephyr of night too much passion opposes,
And in delicate folds now has rumpled her dresses.
On tomorrow’s new ventures the heart eager presses,
I repose now to ponder on life-soothing losses.

“I dwell in Possibility—“

I dwell in Possibility—
A fairer House than Prose—
More numerous of Windows—
Superior—For Doors—

Of Chambers as the Cedars—
Impregnable of Eye—
And for an Everlasting Roof
The Gambrels of the Sky—

Of Visitors—the fairest—
For Occupation—This—
The spreading wide my narrow Hands
To gather Paradise—

"If I should learn, in some quite casual way,"

If I should learn, in some quite casual way,
  That you were gone, not to return again—
Read from the back-page of a paper, say,
  Held by a neighbor in a subway train,
How at the corner of this avenue
  And such a street (so are the papers filled)
A hurrying man—who happened to be you—
  At noon to-day had happened to be killed,
I should not cry aloud—I could not cry
  Aloud, or wring my hands in such a place—
I should but watch the station lights rush by
  With a more careful interest on my face,
Or raise my eyes and read with greater care
Where to store furs and how to treat the hair.

The River

The slow Connecticut,

clean enough

for sweet salmon

to run its course again

snakes through

greening grass banks

unstartled by spring.

We drive across

macadam bridges,

River Road

to River Road,

over a millenium

of winding water

never getting wet.

Is progress counted

in the distance

we travel

or the distance

we still have to go?

Visit to St Mary’s Hospital, 1986

My mother pulled my hand hard
through the hospital gates as though

I was a lifeline. Her mended stockings
looked like sutures on her legs & her shoes

were deformed with walking—she’d searched
our entire town that week to find milk,

& the mud splashes on the back of her legs
had stuck to her skin like leeches.

The hospital smelled of its straining bodies,
its boiled implements creaked

against tissues & rib cages. Lime powder
had been scattered over the middle

of the floor as though death would make
a game of getting to the right bed.

A nurse was waiting for my mother
with scissors & forceps, & the assurance

of someone who’d gutted fish at the market
for years & never heard them screaming.

I played hopscotch on black & white tiles until
I got my mother back: bloodied,

lighter & limping. She wouldn’t look at me
until years later. The walk home was long &

the morning air swelled with the voices of children
playing in the park, among the living. Their laughter

bounced against concrete fences, loud,
as though they thought their mothers would

always come back for them, even
to see them through the last hour of the night.

Look or Ere You Leap

If thou in surety safe wilt sit,
If thou delight at rest to dwell,
Spend no more words than shall seem fit,
Let tongue in silence talk expel:
In all things that thou seest men bent,
See all! say nought! hold thee content!
In worldly works degrees are three,
Makers, doers, and lookers-on:
The lookers-on have liberty
Both the others to judge upon:
Wherefore, in all, as men are bent,
See all! say nought! hold thee content!
The makers oft are in fault found;
The doers doubt of praise or shame;
The lookers-on find surest ground,
They have the fruit, yet free from blame:
This doth persuade in all here meant,
See all! say nought! hold thee content!
The proverb is not south and west,
Which hath been said long time ago,
"Of little meddling cometh rest,
The busy man never wanteth woe':
The best way, is, in all worlds sent,
See all! say nought! hold thee content!

Byzantium

The unpurged images of day recede;
The Emperor's drunken soldiery are abed;
Night resonance recedes, night-walkers' song
After great cathedral gong;
A starlit or a moonlit dome disdains
All that man is,
All mere complexities,
The fury and the mire of human veins.

Before me floats an image, man or shade,
Shade more than man, more image than a shade;
For Hades' bobbin bound in mummy-cloth
May unwind the winding path;
A mouth that has no moisture and no breath
Breathless mouths may summon;
I hail the superhuman;
I call it death-in-life and life-in-death.

Miracle, bird or golden handiwork,
More miracle than bird or handiwork,
Planted on the starlit golden bough,
Can like the cocks of Hades crow,
Or, by the moon embittered, scorn aloud
In glory of changeless metal
Common bird or petal
And all complexities of mire or blood.

At midnight on the Emperor's pavement flit
Flames that no faggot feeds, nor steel has lit,
Nor storm disturbs, flames begotten of flame,
Where blood-begotten spirits come
And all complexities of fury leave,
Dying into a dance,
An agony of trance,
An agony of flame that cannot singe a sleeve.

Astraddle on the dolphin's mire and blood,
Spirit after spirit! The smithies break the flood,
The golden smithies of the Emperor!
Marbles of the dancing floor
Break bitter furies of complexity,
Those images that yet
Fresh images beget,
That dolphin-torn, that gong-tormented sea.

Dirge

The glories of our blood and state
  Are shadows, not substantial things,
There is no armour against fate,
  Death lays his icy hand on Kings;
      Scepter and crown,
      Must tumble down,
And in the dust be equal made,
With the poor crooked scythe and spade.

Some men with swords may reap the field,
  And plant fresh laurels where they kill,
But their strong nerves at last must yield,
  They tame but one another still;
      Early or late,
      They stoop to fate,
And must give up the murmuring breath,
When they, pale captives, creep to death.

The garlands wither on your brow,
  Then boast no more your mighty deeds;
Upon death's purple altar now,
  See where the victor-victim bleeds,
      Your heads must come,
      To the cold tomb;
Only the actions of the just
Smell sweet, and blossom in their dust.

Roads Go Ever On

Roads go ever ever on,
Over rock and under tree,
By caves where never sun has shone,
By streams that never find the sea;
Over snow by winter sown,
And through the merry flowers of June,
Over grass and over stone,
And under mountains in the moon.
Roads go ever ever on,
Under cloud and under star.
Yet feet that wandering have gone
Turn at last to home afar.
Eyes that fire and sword have seen,
And horror in the halls of stone
Look at last on meadows green,
And trees and hills they long have known.
The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way,
Where many paths and errands meet.
The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with weary feet,
Until it joins some larger way,
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.
The Road goes ever on and on
Out from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone.
Let others follow, if they can!
Let them a journey new begin.
But I at last with weary feet
Will turn towards the lighted inn,
My evening-rest and sleep to meet.
Still 'round the corner there may wait
A new road or secret gate;
And though I oft have passed them by,
A day will come at last when I
Shall take the hidden paths that run
West of the Moon, East of the Sun.

The Debt

This is the debt I pay
Just for one riotous day,
Years of regret and grief,
Sorrow without relief.

Pay it I will to the end —
Until the grave, my friend,
Gives me a true release —
Gives me the clasp of peace.

Slight was the thing I bought,
Small was the debt I thought,
Poor was the loan at best —
God! but the interest!

Garden

 I
You are clear
O rose, cut in rock,
hard as the descent of hail.

I could scrape the colour
from the petals
like split dye from a rock

If I could break you
I could break a tree.

If I could stir
I could break a tree—
I could break you.

 II
O wind, rend open the heat,
cut apart the heat,
rend it to tatters.

Fruit cannot drop
through this thick air—
fruit cannot fall into heat

that presses up and blunts
the points of pears
and rounds the grapes.

Cut the heat—
plough through it,
turning it on either side
of you path.

Suicide Note

The calm,
Cool face of the river
Asked me for a kiss.

From the Crucifixion

An accident happens
so fast. The other
scarecrow too attentive
to its metamorphosis into branches
of a tree into knots of trees into bones
of a tree a whole bark
of skin of a twisted pine which bleeds
and cracks close within a dream almost
mythological terrified
the angels crying: Quick! Quick!
There’s not a minute
to lose. Those innocent fellows
circling around
crying at the top of their lungs and losing feathers
which blinded him and
stuck fast to his wounds.

Most Serene. The escutcheon
of murders.
Animals
kneeling and in tears. Keys to the number
of seven. The triangular
wheel of miracles.
The hand
which is not one. The eye
which is not one.
The moral nausea
of the dream. The simple
difficulty of being. The bohemian girl
asleep. The castle
of the chess game. Its free bishop.

On a black school desk
where she raises
her June bugs death
bites her nails bites here penholder
licks the gold beetle of the purple
ink bites rule and licorice
crosses out drawl lines
bites the piebald blotter
draws lines sticks out her tongue
squints licks the beetle
under the eyes the priest what boldness!
But why doesn’t he see
that she’s
copying.

The entire stupefied organism expels
outside the liquid
to avoid the muddy roads
becoming impassable.
It begins
under the arms makes detours
loses its way regroups itself and forms a river
net of anatomy.

The rout came from rusty nails crushing
the very delicate mechanism of a factory
accustomed to working at night without lights.
That ids why the whole inside
rushed out
looking for some exit.
That water of anguish hooked on the angle
of the still living cornices
its drops mad with fear which leap
into the void with desperation.

What cannot be said (and yet
what can’t i say with
my way of forcing words
to be silent) what can’t
be said is the honey
of the bees of the agony. It
flows from the give it binds
with a filthy vertiginous net
the lost profiles at the foot
of a caduceus. You guess
what it’s made of.

And here, a profile
of a face thrown backwards linked to the vinestock
of the legs by
a cloth of a blue similar to the red
bears
evenly balanced on the brow a pillar
of salt. And that other face
in profile shapeless because
of the wen of tears
glues it cheek against the terrible
resin.

A thunder of bedecked wagons with benches
a thunder of clusters of acacia a
thunder of marriage beds
dragged to the floor above
a thunder of barricades
a thunder of cannonade
a thunder of men crying: Over here!
Over here! A thunder
of houses decked with flags acclaims
to heaven a spurt
of blood turned wine. Angel Cégeste
blew the trumpet. And the shadow
of the object rising up became
the object.

It tore from eat to west
the cloth of silence. You heart
silence cry out in such
a way that it was unbearable
to the ear of the heart. A
spray of ink most certainly
full of masterpieces
splashing a black flight
of compromising papers burned in haste.
While a torrential rain
of bayonets
savagely finished off the victims.

On my knees to the right
and to the left. Alone alas
of my species (no reason
to be proud) under a coat
of mail made in figures under
an armor of noise
alone on my knees on the left
on the right—the snow with hands of a blind woman
putting on the table cloth—I close
on my knees alone of my species
alas in this room whose crime
took place the yellow
mouth of my learned wound capable
of saying a few words.

Tú, por si no otro

        Pon la voz
donde tengas la memoria,
hombre, que transformaste
la congoja en conciencia
saludable.
Defiende con palabras
cuanto entiendas,
tú, que tragaste el polvo
de las tardes.
Tú, por si no otro,
condenarás desde tu lengua
la erosión de cada contratiempo.

Tú, que viste crecer
los simulacros del hastío,
entenderás cómo el tiempo
consume al indigente;
tú, que te diste
tus propios mandamientos,
sabrás mejor que nadie
por qué les diste la espalda
a los más tenaces muros de tu aldea.

The One Hundred Years of Solitude of Chinese Poetry

About your poetry –
I'm guessing it adapts to the environment
better than you do.
It's avoided the problem of inheritance.

Digesting its food, it's like swaying corn,
asleep, it's like a pregnant wild dog.
Out for a stroll, it's a stream flowing
past the plaque-like railroad bridge.

It fires language
because language takes work too seriously.
It slaps the customer. It pulls off
The condom of prosody. It reveals impossibility.

It's like a wooden spoon in a non-stick pan
commanding the peas' undeclared war.
These peas are round and plump
but still aren't words.

About the relationship between you and me,
your poetry is an unrented house.
Right now the scene is so empty
it's like a ring picked out somewhere else.

Along the wall, at least it brings out sponge gourds
like those I bought at the morning market, fresh and tender,
clever enough for erotic stories.
It is the life inside of life.

It's astonished by the number of times you've returned.
I try my best not to ask where you've been.
This poem is yours.
Yes, for a moment, it almost seemed not your writing.

The Dark is Rising

When the Dark comes rising, six shall turn it back;
Three from the circle, three from the track;
Wood, bronze, iron; water, fire, stone;
Five will return, and one go alone.

Iron for the birthday, bronze carried long;
Wood from the burning, stone out of song;
Fire in the candle-ring, water from the thaw;
Six Signs the circle, and the grail gone before.

Fire on the mountain shall find the harp of gold
Played to wake the Sleepers, oldest of the old;
Power from the Greenwitch, lost beneath the sea;
All shall find the light at last, silver on the tree.

On the day of the dead, when the year too dies,
Must the youngest open the oldest hills
Through the door of the birds, where the breeze breaks.
There fire shall fly from the raven boy,
And the silver eyes that see the wind,
And the Light shall have the harp of gold.

By the pleasant lake the Sleepers lie,
On Cadfael’s Way where the kestrels call;
Though grim from the Grey King shadows fall,
Yet singing the golden harp shall guide
To break their sleep and bid them ride.

When light from the lost land shall return,
Six Sleepers shall rise, six Signs shall burn,
And where the midsummer tree grows tall
By Pendragon’s sword the Dark shall fall.

Kinder than Man

And God
please let the deer
on the highway
get some kind of heaven.
Something with tall soft grass
and sweet reunion.
Let the moths in porch lights
go someplace
with a thousand suns,
that taste like sugar
and get swallowed whole.
May the mice
in oil and glue
have forever dry, warm fur
and full bellies.
If I am killed
for simply living,
let death be kinder
than man.

Ode on a Grecian Urn

Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness,
Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,
Sylvan historian, who canst thus express
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme:
What leaf-fring'd legend haunts about thy shape
Of deities or mortals, or of both,
In Tempe or the dales of Arcady?
What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?
What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard
Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on;
Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear'd,
Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone:
Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave
Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;
Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,
Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve;
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,
For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!

Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed
Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu;
And, happy melodist, unwearied,
For ever piping songs for ever new;
More happy love! more happy, happy love!
For ever warm and still to be enjoy'd,
For ever panting, and for ever young;
All breathing human passion far above,
That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloy'd,
A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.

Who are these coming to the sacrifice?
To what green altar, O mysterious priest,
Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies,
And all her silken flanks with garlands drest?
What little town by river or sea shore,
Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel,
Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn?
And, little town, thy streets for evermore
Will silent be; and not a soul to tell
Why thou art desolate, can e'er return.

O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede
Of marble men and maidens overwrought,
With forest branches and the trodden weed;
Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought
As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral!
When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st,
"Beauty is truth, truth beauty,--that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."

O Luminous Late Day!

O luminous late day !
The air's enchanted.
The white stork flying by
is half asleep
and the swallows
cross one another—wings
sharp-stretched
to the gold air—
and away
through the benign
distance of evening,
flying, dreaming.

And there is one
returns like the arrow—wings
sharp-stretched
to the sombre air—
bound for the roof
and its black corner there.

The white stork,
like a pot-hook,
tranquil and ungainly
so absurd !
looms on the belfray.

The Game: Christmas Day, 1914

It is so cold.
The lines of this poem are sinking
Into the unforgiving mud. No clean sheet.

Dawn on a perishing day. The weapons freeze
In the hands of a flat back four.
The moon hangs in the air like a ball
Skied by a shivering keeper.
All these boys want to do today
Is shoot, and defend, and attack.

Light on a half-raised wave. The trench-faces
Lifted till you see their breath.
A ball flies in the air like a moon
Kicked through the morning mist.
All these boys want to have today
Is a generous amount of extra time.

No strict formations here, this morning;
No 4-4-2 or 4-5-1
No rules, really. Just a kickabout
With nothing to be won
Except respect. We all showed pictures,
I learned his baby’s name.
Now clear the lines of this poem
And let’s get on with the game.

No white penalty spot, this morning,
The players are all unknown.
You can see them in the graveyards In teams of forgotten stone;
The nets are made of tangled wire,
No Man’s Land is the pitch,
A flare floodlights the moments
Between the dugouts and the ditch.

A hundred winters ago sky opened
To the sunshine of the sun
Shining on these teams of players
And the sounds of this innocent game.
All these boys want to hear today
Is the final whistle. Let them walk away.

It has been so cold. The lines
Of these poems will be found, written
In the unforgotten mud like a team sheet.
Remember them. Read them again.