Some poems
Some poems from poets I need to investigate.
Two cures for love by Wendy Cope
1. Don't see him. Don't phone or write a letter.
2. The easy way: get to know him better.
Defining the Problem by Wendy Cope
I can’t forgive you. Even if I could,
You wouldn’t pardon me for seeing through you.
And yet I cannot cure myself of love
For what I thought you were before I knew you.
driving test by
Bukowski
drivers
in defense and anger
often give the finger
to those
who become involved in their
driving problems.
I am aware what the
signal of the finger
implies
yet when it is directed
at me
sometimes
I can't help laughing at
the florid
twisted
faces
and
the gesture.
yet today
I found myself
giving the finger
to some guy
who pulled directly
into my lane
without waiting
from a supermarket
exit.
I shook the finger at
him.
he saw it
and I drove along right on his
rear
bumper.
it was my first
time.
I was a member of the
club
and I felt like a
fucking
fool.
TALENT by Carol Ann Duffy
This is the word tightrope. Now imagine
a man, inching across it in the space
between our thoughts. He holds our breath.
There is no word net.
You want him to fall, don't you?
I guessed as much; he teeters but succeeds.
The word applause is written all over him.
Adrienne Rich
I know you are reading this poem which is not in your language
guessing at some words while others keep you reading
and I want to know which words they are.
I know you are reading this poem listening for something, torn
between bitterness and hope
turning back once again to the task you cannot refuse.
I know you are reading this poem because there is nothing else
left to read
there where you have landed, stripped as you are.
SCHEHERAZADE: by Richard Siken
Tell me about the dream where we pull the bodies out of the lake
and dress them in warm clothes again.
How it was late, and no one could sleep, the horses running
Until they forget that they are horses.
It’s not like a tree where the roots have to end somewhere,
it’s more like a song on a policeman’s radio,
how we rolled up the carpet so we could dance, and the days
were bright red, and every time we kissed there was another apple
to slice into pieces.
Look at the light through the windowpane. That means it’s noon, that means
we’re inconsolable.
Tell me how all this, and love too, will ruin us.
These, our bodies, possessed by light.
Tell me we’ll never get used to it.
now, if you were teaching creative writing, he asked, what would you tell them? by bukowski
I'd tell them to have an unhappy love
affair, hemorrhoids, bad teeth
and to drink cheap wine,
avoid opera and golf and chess,
to keep switching the head of their
bed from wall to wall
and then I'd tell them to have
another unhappy love affair
and never to use a silk typewriter
ribbon,
avoid family picnics
or being photographed in a rose
garden;
read Hemingway only once,
skip Faulkner
ignore Gogol
stare at photos of Gertrude Stein
and read Sherwood Anderson in bed
while eating Ritz crackers,
realize that people who keep
talking about sexual liberation
are more frightened than you are.
listen to E. Power Biggs work the
organ on your radio while you're
rolling Bull Durham in the dark
in a strange town
with one day left on the rent
after having given up
friends, relatives and jobs.
never consider yourself superior and/
or fair
and never try to be.
have another unhappy love affair.
watch a fly on a summer curtain.
never try to succeed.
don't shoot pool.
be righteously angry when you
find your car has a flat tire.
take vitamins but don't lift weights or jog.
then after all this
reverse the procedure.
have a good love affair.
and the thing
you might learn
is that nobody knows anything-
not the State, nor the mice
the garden hose or the North Star.
and if you ever catch me
teaching a creative writing class
and you read this back to me
I'll give you a straight A
right up the pickle
barrel.
what can we do? Bukowski
at their best, there is gentleness in Humanity.
some understanding and, at times, acts of
courage
but all in all it is a mass, a glob that doesn't
have too much.
it is like a large animal deep in sleep and
almost nothing can awaken it.
when activated it's best at brutality,
selfishness, unjust judgments, murder.
what can we do with it, this Humanity?
nothing.
avoid the thing as much as possible.
treat it as you would anything poisonous, vicious
and mindless.
but be careful. it has enacted laws to protect
itself from you.
it can kill you without cause.
and to escape it you must be subtle.
few escape.
it's up to you to figure a plan.
I have met nobody who has escaped.
I have met some of the great and
famous but they have not escaped
for they are only great and famous within
Humanity.
I have not escaped
but I have not failed in trying again and
again.
before my death I hope to obtain my
life.
Did I Miss Anything?
Tom Wayman
Nothing. When we realized you weren’t here
we sat with our hands folded on our desks
in silence, for the full two hours
Everything. I gave an exam worth
40 percent of the grade for this term
and assigned some reading due today
on which I’m about to hand out a quiz
worth 50 percent
Nothing. None of the content of this course
has value or meaning
Take as many days off as you like:
any activities we undertake as a class
I assure you will not matter either to you or me
and are without purpose
Everything. A few minutes after we began last time
a shaft of light suddenly descended and an angel
or other heavenly being appeared
and revealed to us what each woman or man must do
to attain divine wisdom in this life and
the hereafter
This is the last time the class will meet
before we disperse to bring the good news to all people
on earth.
Nothing. When you are not present
how could something significant occur?
Everything. Contained in this classroom
is a microcosm of human experience
assembled for you to query and examine and ponder
This is not the only place such an opportunity has been
gathered
but it was one place
And you weren’t here
fee sievers
Audrey
She enters the room all frills
And cheap lace in a rush
Of excitement and flurry of hair
Air catching her skirt
Long before she arrives
The smell of mischief seeps
Through walls as he waits for
Her to makes her appearance
The click of her heels on hard
Wood floors give her away
Every time but she feigns
Surprise at his surprise
To see her in the doorway
Every Friday night without fail
Same wine same smile
Same tick of the clock
Ah… Friday nights
The kids sleep at Grandmas
Audrey takes off all her hats
And finds herself again
asmine Vidler
A night out? No problem
Climb over eskies
feel for a bus seat
within a dark cabin polite introductions to all
we move into Highway traffic
pull in a friend’s head from an open window
singing begins
“What do you do with a drunken sailor?”
no one, no one knows all the words
a token lap of the main
on the way to a performance
we find a long driveway to a farm, silence
lights glowing from distant city streets, luminous
sentinel trees grant us brief sanctuary, peace
one bloke pees, then another
finally arrive at the hall for country musical
eat, drink, laugh, sing, talk, gossip
the heckling begins; a heave; smell of vomit
others red with embarrassment
“Nah, there’s no problem officer”
“What do you do with a drunken sailor?”
take him home, the night is over
__________________
having the flu and
with nothing else to do
I read a book about John Dos Passos and according to
the book once radical-communist
John ended up in the Hollywood Hills living off investments
and reading the
Wall Street Journal
this seems to happen all too often.
what hardly ever happens is
a man going from being a young conservative to becoming an
old wild-ass radical
however:
young conservatives always seem to become old
conservatives.
it's a kind of lifelong mental vapor-lock.
but when a young radical ends up an
old radical
the critics
and the conservatives
treat him as if he escaped from a mental
institution.
such is our politics and you can have it
all.
keep it.
sail it up your
ass.
.
Two cures for love by Wendy Cope
1. Don't see him. Don't phone or write a letter.
2. The easy way: get to know him better.
Defining the Problem by Wendy Cope
I can’t forgive you. Even if I could,
You wouldn’t pardon me for seeing through you.
And yet I cannot cure myself of love
For what I thought you were before I knew you.
driving test by
Bukowski
drivers
in defense and anger
often give the finger
to those
who become involved in their
driving problems.
I am aware what the
signal of the finger
implies
yet when it is directed
at me
sometimes
I can't help laughing at
the florid
twisted
faces
and
the gesture.
yet today
I found myself
giving the finger
to some guy
who pulled directly
into my lane
without waiting
from a supermarket
exit.
I shook the finger at
him.
he saw it
and I drove along right on his
rear
bumper.
it was my first
time.
I was a member of the
club
and I felt like a
fucking
fool.
TALENT by Carol Ann Duffy
This is the word tightrope. Now imagine
a man, inching across it in the space
between our thoughts. He holds our breath.
There is no word net.
You want him to fall, don't you?
I guessed as much; he teeters but succeeds.
The word applause is written all over him.
Adrienne Rich
I know you are reading this poem which is not in your language
guessing at some words while others keep you reading
and I want to know which words they are.
I know you are reading this poem listening for something, torn
between bitterness and hope
turning back once again to the task you cannot refuse.
I know you are reading this poem because there is nothing else
left to read
there where you have landed, stripped as you are.
SCHEHERAZADE: by Richard Siken
Tell me about the dream where we pull the bodies out of the lake
and dress them in warm clothes again.
How it was late, and no one could sleep, the horses running
Until they forget that they are horses.
It’s not like a tree where the roots have to end somewhere,
it’s more like a song on a policeman’s radio,
how we rolled up the carpet so we could dance, and the days
were bright red, and every time we kissed there was another apple
to slice into pieces.
Look at the light through the windowpane. That means it’s noon, that means
we’re inconsolable.
Tell me how all this, and love too, will ruin us.
These, our bodies, possessed by light.
Tell me we’ll never get used to it.
now, if you were teaching creative writing, he asked, what would you tell them? by bukowski
I'd tell them to have an unhappy love
affair, hemorrhoids, bad teeth
and to drink cheap wine,
avoid opera and golf and chess,
to keep switching the head of their
bed from wall to wall
and then I'd tell them to have
another unhappy love affair
and never to use a silk typewriter
ribbon,
avoid family picnics
or being photographed in a rose
garden;
read Hemingway only once,
skip Faulkner
ignore Gogol
stare at photos of Gertrude Stein
and read Sherwood Anderson in bed
while eating Ritz crackers,
realize that people who keep
talking about sexual liberation
are more frightened than you are.
listen to E. Power Biggs work the
organ on your radio while you're
rolling Bull Durham in the dark
in a strange town
with one day left on the rent
after having given up
friends, relatives and jobs.
never consider yourself superior and/
or fair
and never try to be.
have another unhappy love affair.
watch a fly on a summer curtain.
never try to succeed.
don't shoot pool.
be righteously angry when you
find your car has a flat tire.
take vitamins but don't lift weights or jog.
then after all this
reverse the procedure.
have a good love affair.
and the thing
you might learn
is that nobody knows anything-
not the State, nor the mice
the garden hose or the North Star.
and if you ever catch me
teaching a creative writing class
and you read this back to me
I'll give you a straight A
right up the pickle
barrel.
what can we do? Bukowski
at their best, there is gentleness in Humanity.
some understanding and, at times, acts of
courage
but all in all it is a mass, a glob that doesn't
have too much.
it is like a large animal deep in sleep and
almost nothing can awaken it.
when activated it's best at brutality,
selfishness, unjust judgments, murder.
what can we do with it, this Humanity?
nothing.
avoid the thing as much as possible.
treat it as you would anything poisonous, vicious
and mindless.
but be careful. it has enacted laws to protect
itself from you.
it can kill you without cause.
and to escape it you must be subtle.
few escape.
it's up to you to figure a plan.
I have met nobody who has escaped.
I have met some of the great and
famous but they have not escaped
for they are only great and famous within
Humanity.
I have not escaped
but I have not failed in trying again and
again.
before my death I hope to obtain my
life.
Did I Miss Anything?
Tom Wayman
Nothing. When we realized you weren’t here
we sat with our hands folded on our desks
in silence, for the full two hours
Everything. I gave an exam worth
40 percent of the grade for this term
and assigned some reading due today
on which I’m about to hand out a quiz
worth 50 percent
Nothing. None of the content of this course
has value or meaning
Take as many days off as you like:
any activities we undertake as a class
I assure you will not matter either to you or me
and are without purpose
Everything. A few minutes after we began last time
a shaft of light suddenly descended and an angel
or other heavenly being appeared
and revealed to us what each woman or man must do
to attain divine wisdom in this life and
the hereafter
This is the last time the class will meet
before we disperse to bring the good news to all people
on earth.
Nothing. When you are not present
how could something significant occur?
Everything. Contained in this classroom
is a microcosm of human experience
assembled for you to query and examine and ponder
This is not the only place such an opportunity has been
gathered
but it was one place
And you weren’t here
fee sievers
Audrey
She enters the room all frills
And cheap lace in a rush
Of excitement and flurry of hair
Air catching her skirt
Long before she arrives
The smell of mischief seeps
Through walls as he waits for
Her to makes her appearance
The click of her heels on hard
Wood floors give her away
Every time but she feigns
Surprise at his surprise
To see her in the doorway
Every Friday night without fail
Same wine same smile
Same tick of the clock
Ah… Friday nights
The kids sleep at Grandmas
Audrey takes off all her hats
And finds herself again
asmine Vidler
A night out? No problem
Climb over eskies
feel for a bus seat
within a dark cabin polite introductions to all
we move into Highway traffic
pull in a friend’s head from an open window
singing begins
“What do you do with a drunken sailor?”
no one, no one knows all the words
a token lap of the main
on the way to a performance
we find a long driveway to a farm, silence
lights glowing from distant city streets, luminous
sentinel trees grant us brief sanctuary, peace
one bloke pees, then another
finally arrive at the hall for country musical
eat, drink, laugh, sing, talk, gossip
the heckling begins; a heave; smell of vomit
others red with embarrassment
“Nah, there’s no problem officer”
“What do you do with a drunken sailor?”
take him home, the night is over
__________________
having the flu and
with nothing else to do
I read a book about John Dos Passos and according to
the book once radical-communist
John ended up in the Hollywood Hills living off investments
and reading the
Wall Street Journal
this seems to happen all too often.
what hardly ever happens is
a man going from being a young conservative to becoming an
old wild-ass radical
however:
young conservatives always seem to become old
conservatives.
it's a kind of lifelong mental vapor-lock.
but when a young radical ends up an
old radical
the critics
and the conservatives
treat him as if he escaped from a mental
institution.
such is our politics and you can have it
all.
keep it.
sail it up your
ass.
.