ungodly agriculture

   

                 STRANGE FRUIT

Southern trees bear a strange fruit

Blood on the leaves and blood at the root

Black bodies swingin' in the Southern breeze

Strange fruit hangin' from the poplar trees

Pastoral scene of the gallant South

The bulgin' eyes and the twisted mouth

Scent of magnolias sweet and fresh

Then the sudden smell of burnin' flesh

Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck

For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck

For the sun to rot, for the tree to drop

Here is a strange and bitter crop




                    Abel Meeropol










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JEALOUSY

                   








                    






                    by




               Sappho         

He is a god in my eyes, that man,
Given to sit in front of you
And close to himself sweetly to hear
The sound of you speaking.

Your magical laughter — this I swear —
Batters my heart — my breast astir —
My voice when I see you suddenly near
Refuses to come.

My tongue breaks up and a delicate fire
Runs through my flesh; I see not a thing
With my eyes, and all that I hear
In my ears is a hum.

The sweat runs down, a shuddering takes
Me in every part and pale as the drying
Grasses, then, I think I am near
The moment of dying.

                 trans. Paul Roche

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more to a heap of dirt

      MOUNTAIN                                    

We’ve placed a cross on your shoulder, 

erected a transmission tower,

planted a spindly flag.

We’ve tunneled through you,

necklaced you with roads, paths, 

apartments, mansions clutching 

like pearls at your throat.  

You, who pressed forth

forced by unrelenting magma, 

who rose

earthen breast, back

primordial.

Now the city gathers round,                                         

temples, spires

obeisant to your deep bass voice—

but freeways, office buildings, industrial parks

oblivious. 

We live beside you in tiny flats

watch phantasmal screens,  

eat, recline, 

groom ourselves for the daily backandforth

squirm into leather

for nights in halogen town.

Still—certain hours—you block the sun:

chilled by your encroaching gloom,

we peer from windows, terraces, to see you 

throw off our ropes and stays, to loom.

                                          Brian Campbell

.....

aqua schola

The Heron                      

I am always watching
the single heron at its place
alone at water, its open eye,
one leg lifted 
or wading without seeming to move.

It is a mystery seen
but never touched
until this morning
when I lift it from its side
where it lays breathing.
I know the beak that could attack,
that unwavering golden eye
seeing me, my own saying I am harmless, 
but if I had that eye, nothing would be safe.
The claws hold tight my hand,
its dun-brown feathers, and the gray
so perfectly laid down.

The bird is more beautiful
than my hand, skin more graceful
than my foot, my own dark eye 
so much more vulnerable, 
the heart beating quickly,
its own language speaking,
You could kill me or help me.
I know you and I have no choice
but to give myself up 
and in whatever supremacy of this moment,
hold your human hand
with my bent claws.

                Linda Hogan

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barely contained

There may be chaos still around the world,
This little world that in my thinking lies;
For mine own bosom is the paradise
Where all my life’s fair visions are unfurled.
Within my nature’s shell I slumber curled,
Unmindful of the changing outer skies,
Where now, perchance, some new-born Eros flies,
Or some old Cronos from his throne is hurled.
I heed them not; or if the subtle night
Haunt me with deities I never saw,
I soon mine eyelid’s drowsy curtain draw
To hide their myriad faces from my sight.
They threat in vain; the whirlwind cannot awe
A happy snow-flake dancing in the flaw

                    George Santayana

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how jaded grows the heart

        LOVE SONG                                                    






My own dear love, he is strong and bold
And he cares not what comes after.
His words ring sweet as a chime of gold,
And his eyes are lit with laughter.
He is jubilant as a flag unfurled --
Oh, a girl, she'd not forget him.
My own dear love, he is all my world, --
And I wish I'd never met him.

My love, he's mad, and my love, he's fleet,
And a wild young wood-thing bore him!
The ways are fair to his roaming feet,
And the skies are sunlit for him.
As sharply sweet to my heart he seems
As the fragrance of acacia.
My own dear love, he is all my dreams, --
And I wish he were in Asia.

My love runs by like a day in June,
And he makes no friends of sorrows.
He'll tread his galloping rigadoon
In the pathway of the morrows.
He'll live his days where the sunbeams start,
Nor could storm or wind uproot him.
My own dear love, he is all my heart, --
And I wish somebody'd shoot him.










                                 Dorothy Parker  ( nee' )  Rothschild


















....

peregrino mysterium

CODA                               










A strong song tows
us, long earsick.
Blind, we follow
rain slant, spray flick
to fields we do not know.

Night, float us.
Offshore wind, shout,
ask the sea
what’s lost, what’s left,
what horn sunk,
what crown adrift.

Where we are who knows
of kings who sup
while day fails? Who,
swinging his axe
to fell kings, guesses
where we go?                         

                       Basil Bunting

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