Category Archives: poetry

O come and tell me of the when.

poetry,

KNOW’ST THOU THE WAY?

O littel bird! know’st thou the way
Which is unknown to me?
How swift thou flewest at break of day,
With heart all full of glee!

Around thy neck my message tied,
Full of my longing mind;
Thy speed the sailor has outvied,
Thou waitest for no wind.

No sweet reply can I get now;
No word to ease my pain;
I know not when, I know not how,
Or if we meet again.

O might that be, what gladness then!
I’d sing, sweet bird, like thee;
O come and tell me of the when
That happy time shall be.

-Theodor Kjerulf (1825 – 1888) Norway

Mikhail Olennikov, Rest Under the Bird Cherry

Fierce hour and sweet.

Holy Week, poetry, ,

A famous poem for Palm Sunday that I don’t think I have ever posted before:

THE DONKEY

When fishes flew and forests walked
And figs grew upon thorn,
Some moment when the moon was blood
Then surely I was born;

With monstrous head and sickening cry
And ears like errant wings,
The devil’s walking parody
On all four-footed things.

The tattered outlaw of the earth,
Of ancient crooked will;
Starve, scourge, deride me: I am dumb,
I keep my secret still.

Fools! For I also had my hour;
One far fierce hour and sweet:
There was a shout about my ears,
And palms before my feet.

-G.K. Chesterton

 

The reality of blood and beetles.

poetry, reality,

NOTE TO REALITY

Without even knowing it, I have
believed in you for a long time.
When I looked at my blood under a microscope
                I could see truth multiplying over and over.
—Not police sirens, nor history books, not stage-three lymphoma
                                                                                     persuaded me
but your honeycombs and beetles; the dry blond fascicles of grass
                                                              thrust up above the January snow.
Your postcards of Picasso and Matisse,
                                         from the museum series on European masters.
When my friend died on the way to the hospital
                                           it was not his death that so amazed me
but that the driver of the cab
                                              did not insist upon the fare.
Quotation marks: what should we put inside them?
Shall I say “I”  “have been hurt” “by”  “you,”  you neglectful monster?
I speak now because experience has shown me
                                 that my mind will never be clear for long.
I am more thick-skinned and male, more selfish, jealous, and afraid
                                   than ever in my life.
“For my heart is tangled in thy nets;
                              my soul enmeshed in cataracts of time…”
The breeze so cool today, the sky smeared with bluish grays and whites.
The parade for the slain police officer
goes past the bakery
and the smell of fresh bread

makes the mourners salivate against their will.

-Tony Hoagland