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Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Searching... Author: BANG, MARY JO Matches Found: 141 Bang, Mary Jo Poet's Biography 141 poems available by this author & THERE HE KEPT HER, VERY WELL First Line: Harsh orange, dull burn Last Line: Look-- %it's hecate, a torch in each hand Variant Title(s): & There He Kept Her Very Wel A CAKE OF NINETEEN SLICES Poem Text First Line: She was aware of the alarm Last Line: A real of no real appeal Subject(s): Cakes; Nature; Reality A HURRICRANIUM, HE SAID Poem Text First Line: Rain on the outside, horror on the in ANA OF BLISS First Line: The risk of proximity is always Last Line: Over acres of break-heart slate AND AS IN ALICE Poem Text First Line: Alice cannot be in the poem, she says, because Subject(s): Metaphor; Similes ANOTHER SURGERY / I SHOULD BE PREPARED BY NOW Last Line: Pass me the specimen - that warm souvenir-- %words, floating in a blood-tinged bath Subject(s): Healing APOLOGY FOR WANT First Line: I've worried far too much about the eye Last Line: Sends us out dressed in ragged tulle, but won't tell %where it last buried the acorn or bone ASHES First Line: Under snow, the park is monotone Last Line: And had seen the light-- %if he didn't love her by now, he never would AUTOPSY First Line: How bare the soul--unmasked, deveined Last Line: And the mildly curious have all come %to watch. You bloom in this forest of white BACK FROM BEDLAM First Line: You've come riding back from bedlam on a half-starved horse Last Line: Leaving me to finger the gluey, thin threads of a spider's web %and pocket the folded notes I find h BARTOK IN THE SCULPTURE GARDEN First Line: Bows like swords impaling air, lit windows Last Line: A second time--four metronomes--& gash %the night BEAUTIES OF NATURE First Line: She'd grown tired, she admitted, %of the picturesque Last Line: Pool of all the gone beloveds. %one by one %she held them under BECKETT REMEMBERED First Line: On the train platform, people wave Subject(s): Beckett, Samuel (1906-1989) BECKETT REMEMBERED First Line: On the train platform, people wave Subject(s): Beckett, Samuel (1906-1989) BEGIN HERE First Line: O onion, o open, o equal-eyed quail egg %with swell yellow lake Last Line: From a growing alert. %magnanimous this. %and kindling. %and tinder BEHIND THIS PASSION First Line: Through small but audacious acts of theft Last Line: Course the ragged card stock, become %a noisy rorschach, dark mirror facing out CAFE EDGAR First Line: It's madness: white peonies, bird of paradise Last Line: We wake to sleep. This is the bread: body, soul, %exquisite tenderness. We are all we have CAKE OF NINETEEN SLICES First Line: She was aware of the alarm Last Line: A real of no real appeal Subject(s): Cakes; Nature; Reality CALIBAN First Line: Forgive me. What I took was an arm, a hand Last Line: With something that's hidden: transform, %transfigure me Subject(s): Bodies CASE OF ASYMMETRY First Line: In this case, the right eye sees better than the left yet not enough Last Line: Poor eye, she said, from the off-center door of her head CATASTROPHE THEORY II Poem Text Recitation by Author First Line: The foot goes forward, yes. Subject(s): Science; Scientists CATASTROPHE THEORY III Poem Text Recitation by Author First Line: Now we sit and play with a tiny toy Subject(s): Loss CHICAGO First Line: On the 44th floor, plate glass against night Last Line: I am unfallen. The world without me %has rarely seemed this clear CLAIRVOYANT First Line: Whose face doesn't fall? Cruel mockery Last Line: I am the earth, quartz-fret and sparks of salt. %I will be pressed against. Known COMPLICATIONS OF MORNING First Line: Here we have the blankness of endings Last Line: He says, good-luck, with your minuscule condition CONSTANT BRIDE First Line: Do you understand the concept? The marvel? Tender at the neck Last Line: From which to choose: sleep and may she never wake CRACKED JAR CALLED CAN IT BE TAUGHT? First Line: After ten years of seeking, light was thrown Last Line: It cannot be taught CROSSED-OVER, FIEND-SNITCHED, X-ED OUT First Line: O sweetie, o hon, in this weather-split sea pea Last Line: Comes to mind, the reek of lilac and laburnum DARK SMUDGED THE PATH UNTRAMMELED Poem Text First Line: The room was warm, sugar sweet, and wormwood bitter Subject(s): Separation DAY TWO OF A NEW BEAR First Line: Steam lisps from the crack where the continuing broke Last Line: You'll know a dismantling by the refuse it leaves %the slope by the slant of its bill DEATH AND THE MAIDEN First Line: He holds me high. His arms, his arms. %this is what Last Line: Perfect seduction-rokee rokee- %o let him see DEFINITELY Poem Text First Line: What is desire Subject(s): Desire DESERT ON HAND First Line: Love is also fragment: the cheek Last Line: The elevated %tor, unbreakable oath DOES MRS. HUNT TEAR LINEN STRAIGHT AS EVER? First Line: Louise, lying half-dressed on a hideabed, said Last Line: For god's sake, let us sit upon the ground' DOG BARK First Line: Louise peered into the corner of the cabinet Last Line: To be alive, and refused to let it be altered DOLL First Line: In the dream there'd been difficulty Last Line: We spent the night in a place called small pleasure DOWNSTREAM EXTREMITY OF THE ISLE OF SWANS First Line: In the window a jacket cried wear me, wear me Last Line: See. And who would know it had ever been? ELECTRA DREAMS First Line: Night is when I give you new clothes Last Line: To call love by a name other than vengeance ELEGY First Line: The eye isn't everything Last Line: Into knotgrass and bindweed, %eddy and ash ELEMENTS OF STYLE First Line: First, I'm delicate-- Last Line: In grosgrain and difficult. %beautiful END, AND SOMETIME LATER First Line: Here, my pretty, lay %your head upon this pillow, press Last Line: Forever, fixed. Fastidious %in a painted faint ENVY AND AVARICE First Line: One wants a red sky at night Last Line: And getting it all wrong ERA First Line: Of some reveller reeving through Last Line: Oh, no. He wouldn't lie EYE LIKE A STRANGE BALLOON MOUNTS TOWARD INFINITY First Line: We were going toward nothing Last Line: And then the curtain drops FALL First Line: What brought me here to walk a room's periphery Last Line: Bright night of distance. My father continues to play %although I am paradise leaving him FALLING OUT First Line: She loved the lyric lines that formed the house Last Line: The symbolic and sorry FEBRUARY ELEGY Poem Text First Line: This bald year, frozen now in february. Subject(s): Death - Children; Death - Babies FIRST ROOM IS A WOMAN First Line: Stethoscope in my coat pocket--a coiled snake-- Last Line: I laud their easy access, their utility %as conduit, groove. And road FOOT HOOKED First Line: Pity the poor rabbit and the man with the monocle Last Line: All lies are alike FROM A NEW PLACE First Line: In answer to your question: yes Last Line: Wanting no one here %to see the worn, the ragged, the missing GIRLS DRESS WELL TO STAVE OFF CHAOS First Line: To stop is to cave Last Line: Flung stones, rattled chains, shaved men GIVEN TO BELIEVE First Line: It was taste, wasn't it? The sharp bite of the bad apple Last Line: She lay near the sea she weeped. She said she %and her love were one and two. The sea was three and GRANITE CITY, MONTANA First Line: A ghost town begs you to stare-- Last Line: Poised over dark earth, %brighter blood, belated warning: it is over GRETEL First Line: Mother, I am bare in a mist-mad forest Last Line: Forsworn, to grasp with wet hands the cold %metal of life, then find a way to let go HAM PAINTS A PICTURE TO ILLUSTRATE AN EARLY LESSON: O TRAUMA! First Line: He remembered the dog bite. The door Last Line: Love-oh, what a word! HARBOR First Line: Where she finds hot and haze, a thin man crossing a street Last Line: O the idea of order. It will be seen through HEAD-HEAVY ON ITS SNAKESTALK, THE TULIP First Line: Agile in motion-but glacial, too syrup to see Last Line: But never loses control. Or leans, and falls. %then rises. No, rose. No end HERE'S A FINE WORD: PRETTIPLEASE First Line: Mrs. Donna spoke, saying it was all very clear Last Line: You'll be easy to love. He said, lie down, and I did HOLY GRAIL First Line: If it were simple, would we have come? Last Line: Bodies absorb the damp ricochet %of a pigeon trapped against glass HOW BEAUTIFUL Poem Text First Line: A personal lens: glass bending rays HOW TO LEAVE A PRAIRIE First Line: Don't worry, the moon will rise Last Line: Lawn orb and tractor. Let a woman sob %at a window--silhouetted, otherworldly IF WISHES WERE HORSES First Line: That the wound had never been Last Line: Airy nothings, making promises: hay and a bed %in the stable, if only IN A SPACIOUS CHAMBER First Line: She pressed herself against him. %she was close Last Line: On and in while she was the patience of skin %becoming the picture of having IN ORDER NOT TO BE ETEN NOR ALL TO TORNE First Line: The elevator mirror tells me nothing, not how Last Line: Push them aside. They must be held--but surely %you know this--by their ears IN THE BOOK OF ALL THAT'S BEFALLEN First Line: There were one hundred eighteen miniatures Last Line: All had befallen, and someone was sobbing IN THIS BUSINESS OF TOUCH AND BE TOUCHED First Line: It's overdetermined, the body-- Last Line: The shrouded want of cheek and shoulder %that arms can't reach, throat refuses to ask IT SAYS, I DID SO First Line: A plaid is formed of yellow block and black Last Line: These are not artificial tears IT'S WINTER IN THE EYE, AND LIKE OPHELIA First Line: The long bones lay her down %until indigo dawn slivers sleep from her spent eye Last Line: Does she not know herself? %every petty artery KISS, KISS, SAID LOUISE BY WAY OF A PAY PHONE First Line: To the other who'd been left behind Last Line: It's a fantastic sea where nothing but nothing can save us L EQUALS LOOK Poem Text First Line: At a book of details LIKE A FIRE IN A FIRE First Line: They were difficult to find. It was summer so Last Line: Of shoulder with faint smell of soap LIKE SPIDERS, STEP BY STEP First Line: We're moving duchess, or so it seems Last Line: Covers years of shamed wear %and loss is now what you live with LOOK AGAIN First Line: I'm on the ferry between dover and calais Last Line: He makes a perfect pirouette for the camera, %and somebody captures the back of his head LOUISE IN LOVE First Line: Much had transpired in the phantom realm Last Line: Dainty wile, frayed thing, %fish hook LOUISE SIGHS, SUCH A LONG WINTER, THIS Poem Text First Line: Stone basin, stone breath, stone bric-a-brac Subject(s): Parties; Winter LOUISE SIGHS, SUCH A LONG WINTER, THIS First Line: Stone basin, stone breath, stone bric-a-brac Last Line: The five fluid ounce flask has gone missing Subject(s): Parties; Winter MAX ERNST AND DOROTHEA TANNING First Line: Listen, here, as always, there are links Last Line: We don't blink. We stay stopped METAPHOR AS SYMPTOM OF REASON'S DESPAIR First Line: I took the bus home just to be near a neighborhood Last Line: In snow, impelled by a grammar that cannot be heard. %fog on the car window, veil over nothing at al MOTHER First Line: You are the tapeworm Last Line: Dutiful daughter, %I feel you swell with pride MOUTH IN CLARITY First Line: Is criminal to itself: add to silence the human Last Line: Of a choice: dull love or love- %ly opulence. O flamingo MRS. AUTUMN AND HER TWO DAUGHTERS First Line: We live in an ocean Last Line: You are wrong she says. You don't wear your cape NIGHT SONG First Line: Night sings to me through my wrists Last Line: Moves mutely through me: %subcutaneum, pericranium, blood and bone NO TALKING First Line: No talking in the grass, only persistent scars Last Line: Hands spill the pond water. Nothing can be grasped. %why indelible hunger? Why insatiable need? NONESUCH First Line: It's meaning we're looking for Last Line: There is a garden under this one, %a lover there of whom you're sure NOVEL IN THREE CHAPTERS First Line: The subway mouse crackled the wrapper Last Line: It was clearly a bargain, clearly a good buy ON THE SUBJECT OF CONJURING First Line: Firstly: asking is an act of harmony, an impertinence purring Last Line: Earthly: I know things ON THIS LATE STAGE First Line: She said, it's true, my turtle dove, trucks do roll Last Line: She knows us not at all OPEN HEART SURGERY First Line: I watched as one man's heart filled the hand Last Line: Was whispering in my ear: circle one. %you were made for something bitter, bitter, better OPHELIA First Line: She should have brought a book to read Last Line: Dressed in khaki and daffodil, o waited ORACLE First Line: I listen to warnings. A distant ping may be an avalanche Last Line: You know what will happen. %you'll abandon the crops, repair the mountain again ORIGIN OF THE IMPULSE TO SPEAK First Line: From physical grace, gradually refusing any but relative Last Line: Happiness. Prophet of keeping quiet PACKING THE HEART Poem Text First Line: The evil of exactitude is that a ledge is so wide Last Line: Of course, but no more Subject(s): Evil PACKING THE HEART First Line: The evil of exactitude is that a ledge is so wide Last Line: Pure; I am dead, I cannot allow myself to be so used. A little, of course, %of course, but no more Subject(s): Evil PEAR AND O, AN OPERA First Line: They kept us thin, but o when the treats came! Last Line: A chorus singing how happy they were. %how happy could they be PERSEPHONE LEAVING First Line: She's picking flowers, meadow goldenrod Last Line: To look at him--seven pomegranate seeds clutched %in her hand and the always ravenous hunger PILGRIMAGE First Line: I wonder what you would think Last Line: Of fireworks. (brittle you were, yes, %but so lovely.) POEM First Line: Could you please hold that mirror Last Line: The light of the world RAVEN FEEDS REYNARD First Line: Seeded yeast in her beak and bending Last Line: Every peril paired with it's opposite %until REAL TIME First Line: Made of brown bakelite, this clock is different Last Line: With whom I spend the endless nights. Begs me to name %the beating heart, in the tigerwood box just REIGN OF UNREASON First Line: The year's end: a period Last Line: The garments they wore, fripperies of holly bough. %how fortunate we'll be then, how purely defined RENUNCIATION OF DREAMS AND SUCH Poem Text First Line: The night you wandered in the wrong direction Last Line: For the treason of warmth Subject(s): Dreams; Nightmares RENUNCIATION OF DREAMS AND SUCH First Line: The night you wandered in the wrong direction Last Line: And temperature - in a system where zero stands %for the treason of warmth Subject(s): Dreams RIVER UP, RISING First Line: Don't you love the east gate, the way it opens Last Line: You are floating with disaster SCREEN DOOR SLAMS First Line: We leave my brother's red toy tractor Last Line: Of my mother's skirt, %whisper, I wasn't SHE COULDN'T SING AT ALL, AT ALL First Line: Louise said. No subtle cadences capturing birdnote Last Line: Someone singing 'sometimes a bun, sometimes only a %biscuit' SLOW DANCER First Line: These are difficult times. Your beloved won't speak Last Line: Dance with someone who calls himself sadness. %when night arrives soundless--nestle against him SMALL HOSPITAL FOR THE INSANE First Line: How fierce the latch looks but motion is hope Last Line: As example to us all. How safe it is to be gone SO THIS First Line: So, this is reality-a ghostscape in the afternoon Last Line: A frond. A tangle of twos. A terrible knot SPEECH IS DESIGNED TO PERSUADE Poem Text First Line: Here we are, my dear, so near we could touch Subject(s): Togetherness SPEECH IS DESIGNED TO PERSUADE First Line: Here we are, my dear, so near we could touch Last Line: Let the bell for waking keep breaking in STAR'S WHOLE SECRET First Line: Did she drink tea? Yes, please. And after Last Line: And the lavish wick, breathless in the remnant %of a fire STILL KNIFE STILL SUSPENDED First Line: From where she sat she could see Last Line: By a kitten was just then released and ran by STONE, MONTANA First Line: It's time for the feasting that follows the four men it took Last Line: Aloofness is stone. So said, the heroes all applaud, and wildly THE DIARY OF A LOST GIRL Poem Text First Line: Four diphtheria deaths, then fire, now five named lakes THE EYE LIKE A STRANGE BALLOON MOUNTS TOWARD INFINITY Poem Text Recitation by Author First Line: We were going toward nothing THE MEDICINAL COTTON CLOUDS COME DOWN TO COVER THEM Poem Text First Line: To smother their smallness Subject(s): Love - Erotic THE PENGUIN CHIAROSCURO Poem Text First Line: The acrobat on the rosinback circled the track THE ROLE OF ELEGY Poem Text Subject(s): Masks; Tragedy THIS SUPPOSED ALCHEMY Poem Text First Line: What you took was: an arm, a hand, a face Last Line: It no longer meets Subject(s): Absence; Alchemy & Alchemists; Love; Separation; Isolation THIS SUPPOSED ALCHEMY First Line: What you took was: an arm, a hand, a face Last Line: The check will always be proffered, but the seam, %it no longer meets Subject(s): Absence; Alchemy And Alchemists; Love THREE PARTS OF AN X First Line: Of course I'm afraid Last Line: And how much fun %could that be? Tsk. Tsk THREE TREES Poem Text First Line: The aqua green goes with the pink Subject(s): Trees THREE TREES First Line: The aqua green goes with the pink Last Line: There, there, says someone TO DANCE THE TARANTELLA First Line: There will always be those who wear a felt hat Last Line: Take off your felt hat, I beg you TOUR OF THE MARCH EQUINOX First Line: Above the water, a filament of bright light unhinges air Last Line: Through the pinhole, tell me, what do you see? TRAVEL IS EASY BY TRAIN First Line: Don't you love a narrow corridor? Ham asked. Only one way Last Line: The new, louise said, blasphemes. You know it does TWILIGHT AMNESIA First Line: Born of bonehouse and charnel, from forgive Last Line: An untender beginning. I cannot, nor would I %give back what's been given UNTITLED Recitation by Author Subject(s): Death - Children; Death - Babies USES OF RESTRAINT First Line: The porch is gray--midway between flint Last Line: Taped to a white metal door: bread, %milk. Lamb, with a red line through it WAKING IN ANTIBES First Line: The sea dazes itself at our feet while we break Last Line: We'll rise, leaving nothing behind, no dirt clods, %no mourners. The sea will be, as we left it WHAT WAS SEEN First Line: Who wouldn't have grown into longing Last Line: Enormous horror, brigand slaughter. The end. The end WHAT WITHIN First Line: In this sober domain, the first girl's name was cookie Last Line: I'm made of wood, she said, and warp WHEN APRIL WAS BEGINNING, AND END First Line: April was marching to an easy puppet beat. Slow vernal birth Last Line: In april's court, you talk-sure-but she don't listen WHEN MEETING BEAUTY First Line: What must we do? Last Line: Upon? Now, back to the exhausted topic WHEN THE WEATHER CHANGES TO WARM, THE BOYS DRIVE SHIRTLESS Poem Text First Line: Their cigarettes wasting to nought Last Line: And trembling, death and the endless expanse Subject(s): Change; Driving & Drivers; Weather WHEN THE WEATHER CHANGES TO WARM, THE BOYS DRIVE SHIRTLESS First Line: Their cigarettes wasting to nought Last Line: That is not an event Subject(s): Change; Driving And Drivers; Weather WHERE SNOW FALLS First Line: Finally, simple Last Line: No one here is ever lost; nothing %cannot be won YEAR CHASES ITS TAIL First Line: When it's april in the eye, it's december elsewhere Last Line: Some called it time, others argued, compulsion YOU KNOW Poem Text First Line: You know, don't you, what we're doing here? YOU WERE YOU ARE ELEGY Poem Text First Line: Fragile like a child is fragile Subject(s): Love; Loss YOU'RE WALKING ON BLUE STONE SIDEWALKS AND, First Line: Here they come, the two boys, pssibility and his pally, disaster Last Line: P. Turns and implores, mabo for three? D. Countermands, or- %the mordant air, the beach seat, the se |
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