Poems that I love

by Leonard Cohen Dont really know who sent me To raise my voice and say: May the lights in the land of plenty Shine on the truth some day. I dont know why I come here, Knowing as I do, What you really think of me, What I really think of you. For the millions in a prison, That wealth has set apart, For the christ who has not risen, From the caverns of the heart. For the innermost decision, That we cannot but obey - For whats left of our religion, I lift my voice and pray: May the lights in the land of plenty Shine on the truth some day.

T his morning, I started getting ready to clean up my room, pack a bag and head up to St Dot’s later in the week. Lewis Headrick, an old friend from the days when Issan lived at Hartford St, shot me a message on Facebook which turned my attention around. He said he read "Ad patrem sinensis" aloud at breakfast with his spouse, and I began looking for more of Phil Whalen’s poetry. After Phil died in 2002, Poltroon Press put the out of print, Prolegomena to a Study of the Universe up online as a kind of tribute. http://www.poltroonpress.com/whalen.html It was and is a generous and lovely act in this world of words. I take the liberty of quoting here from this short, wonderful book. (I apologize that the type-face is small. I had to reduce it in order to keep Phil’s arrangement of the lines on the page. Put on your reading glasses – it’s worth it!) From Kevin Power’s Introduction: Buddha in an early sutra sets out one of Whalen’s essential poetic princip

by Dylan Thomas An excerpt from A Child's Christmas in Wales . While sorting my thoughts about Christmas, it hit me: at the family celebration that I have invited to, I will see the same uncles I see every year! And I am one of them. "Were there Uncles like in our house?"   "There are always Uncles at Christmas. The same Uncles. And on Christmas morning, with dog-disturbing whistle and sugar fags, I would scour the swatched town for the news of the little world, and find always a dead bird by the Post Office or by the white deserted swings; perhaps a robin, all but one of his fires out. Men and women wading or scooping back from chapel, with taproom noses and wind-bussed cheeks, all albinos, huddles their stiff black jarring feathers against the irreligious snow. Mistletoe hung from the gas brackets in all the front parlors; there was sherry and walnuts and bottled beer and crackers by the dessertspoons; and cats in their fur-a

by W. H. Auden You can never read too much Auden. And there is an enormous amount to read. Even though Christmas is not the time for academic lectures, for anyone who thinks that I have perhaps gone overboard on Auden, I refer you to Adam Gopnik’s article in the New Yorker: The Double Man Why Auden is an indispensable poet of our time. Well, so that is that. Now we must dismantle the tree, Putting the decorations back into their cardboard boxes -- Some have got broken -- and carrying them up to the attic. The holly and the mistletoe must be taken down and burnt, And the children got ready for school. There are enough Left-overs to do, warmed-up, for the rest of the week -- Not that we have much appetite, having drunk such a lot, Stayed up so late, attempted -- quite unsuccessfully -- To love all of our relatives, and in general Grossly overestimated our powers. Once again As in previous years we have seen the actual Vision and failed To do

by Richard Wilbur A stable-lamp is lighted Whose glow shall wake the sky; The stars shall bend their voices, And every stone shall cry. And every stone shall cry, And straw like gold shall shine; A barn shall harbor heaven, A stall become a shrine. The child through David’s city Shall ride in triumph by: The palm shall strew its branches, And every stone shall cry. And every stone shall cry, Though heavy, dull, and dumb, And lie within the roadway To pave his kingdom come. Yet he shall be forsaken, And yielded up to die; The sky shall groan and darken, And every stone shall cry. And every stone shall cry For stony hearts of men: God’s love upon the spearhead, God’s love refused again. But now, as at the ending, The low is lifted high; The stars shall bend their voices, And every stone shall cry. In praises of the child By whose decent among us The worlds are reconciled.

by Jack Gilbert How astonishing it is that language can almost mean, and frightening that it does not quite. Love, we say, God, we say, Rome and Michiko, we write, and the words get it all wrong. We say bread and it means according to which nation. French has no word for home, and we have no word for strict pleasure. A people in northern India is dying out because their ancient tongue has no words for endearment. I dream of lost vocabularies that might express some of what we no longer can. Maybe the Etruscan texts would finally explain why the couples on their tombs are smiling. And maybe not. When the thousands of mysterious Sumerian tablets were translated, they seemed to be business records. But what if they are poems or psalms? My joy is the same as twelve Ethiopian goats standing silent in the morning light. O Lord, thou art slabs of salt and ingots of copper, as grand as ripe barley lithe under the wind's labor. Her breasts are six white oxen loaded with bolts of lon

By Ikkyu A master's handiwork cannot be measured But still priests wag their tongues explaining the "Way" and babbling about "Zen." This old monk has never cared for false piety And my nose wrinkles at the dark smell of incense before the Buddha.