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Author: ORR, GREGORY
Matches Found: 236


Orr, Gregory    Poet's Biography
236 poems available by this author


(TRAUMA) STORM    Poem Text    
First Line: Hunkered down, nerve-numb
Last Line: Where tender is not.
Subject(s): Self


A DARK NIGHT    Poem Text    
First Line: How I long to pull the old man in
Last Line: How dark it is; how far I am from shore.
Subject(s): Night; Sailing & Sailors; Sea; Bedtime; Ocean


A DREAM OF FIFTY    Poem Text    
First Line: Among all the losses, this was immense
Last Line: Wind pressing leaves against a grid of fence.
Subject(s): Aging; Birthdays; Dreams; Future; Life; Loss; Nightmares


A HALF-DEAD BLACK CHERRY TREE ACROSS THE ROAD FROM MY CHILDHOOD HOUSE    Poem Text    
First Line: Remnant of some lost orchard
Last Line: Toward your slow heart.
Subject(s): Cherry Trees; Children; Childhood


A HOUSE JUST LIKE HIS MOTHER'S    Poem Text    
Subject(s): Mothers; Home


A LA MYSTERIEUSE       
First Line: Only in books I knew you
Last Line: To the small of your back.
Subject(s): Man-woman Relationships; Male-female Relations


A LARGE WHITE ROCK CALLED 'THE SLEEPING ANGEL'    Poem Text    
First Line: He lay down in this field to rest


A LARGE WHITE ROCK CALLED THE SLEEPING ANGEL       
First Line: He lay down in this field to rest


A LIFE       
First Line: At dawn you curl up in the top branches
Last Line: In the darkness below.
Subject(s): Life


A LITANY    Poem Text    
First Line: I remember him falling beside me
Last Line: Or lay in the shallow spoon.
Subject(s): Brothers; Death; Fratricide; Murder; Half-brothers; Dead, The


A MOMENT    Poem Text    
First Line: The field where my brother died
Last Line: The next you're alone in a field.
Subject(s): Brothers; Death; Fratricide; Murder; Half-brothers; Dead, The


A PARABLE    Poem Text    
First Line: The stone strikes the body, because
Last Line: With him until he dies.
Subject(s): Death; Pain; Dead, The; Suffering; Misery


A SHELF IS A LEDGE       
First Line: I don't understand by what perversity
Last Line: As he screams in the dark: survive! Survive!
Subject(s): Books; Darwin, Charles (1809-1882); Inanimate Objects; Survival; Reading


A SNAKE ...    Poem Text    
First Line: A snake no bigger
Last Line: On the open clasp.
Variant Title(s): A Snake
Subject(s): Animals; Death; Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus; Snakes; Dead, The; Serpents; Vipers


A SONG    Poem Text    
First Line: The other world's not for me --
Last Line: But to come back up: bud and leaf.
Subject(s): Death; Nature; Dead, The


AFTER DEATH    Poem Text    
First Line: I heard the front door close
Last Line: Was a kind of steady weeping.
Subject(s): Brothers; Death; Death - Children; Family Life; Mourning; Half-brothers; Dead, The; Death - Babies; Relatives; Bereavement


AFTER PIERO DI COSIMO'S VENUS, MARS, AND AMOR       
First Line: Naked on the ground
Last Line: Mars's discarded armor.
Subject(s): Mars (god); Mythology - Classical; Sculpture & Sculptors; Venus (goddess)


AFTER THE GUEST    Poem Text    
First Line: The guest departs
Subject(s): Guests; Marriage; Visiting; Weddings; Husbands; Wives


AFTER THE GUEST; FOR MY BROTHER    Poem Text    
First Line: The guest departs
Last Line: I pray we'll grow old.
Subject(s): Brothers; Death; Grief; Guests; Marriage; Half-brothers; Dead, The; Sorrow; Sadness; Visiting; Weddings; Husbands; Wives


ANNUNCIATION       
First Line: In simone martini's annunciation
Last Line: That a man could be an angel


AUBADE       
First Line: Up and down the street the sound
Last Line: Up and down the street the sound
Subject(s): City & Town Life


AUBADE       
First Line: Up and down the street the sound
Last Line: He grinds his enemies' corn


BE-ALL    Poem Text    
First Line: The insect clings
Last Line: Will become belong.
Subject(s): Future Life; Heaven; Longing; Retribution; Eternity; After Life; Paradise


BECAUSE I SENSED    Poem Text    


BECAUSE I SENSED       
Last Line: All nerve, %all tingle and cringe
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


BEGGAR'S SONG    Poem Text    
First Line: Here's a seed. Food
Last Line: Screaming for more.
Subject(s): Begging & Beggars; Hunger


BEGINNING    Poem Text    
First Line: You stand alone in the empty street
Last Line: You will make each journey many times.
Subject(s): Life Change Events


BEST    Poem Text    
First Line: The greeks said: never to be born is best
Last Line: But the greeks were wrong: to live and love is best.
Subject(s): Greece; Life; Love; Poetry & Poets; Villon, Francois (1431-1463); Greeks


BETRAYALS/HADES, EURYDICE, ORPHEUS    Poem Text    
First Line: She stood before his throne
Last Line: Do not turn your back on her
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus; Betrayal


BOLT FROM THE BLUE    Poem Text    
First Line: 1. Bolt from the blue
Last Line: And debris—is aftermath.
Subject(s): Death; Lightning; Pain; Dead, The; Lightning Rods; Suffering; Misery


BY THE SHORE       
First Line: Some of the women knelt %on the muddy shore
Last Line: And listened now inside, %listened to orpheus
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


CARTOONS       
First Line: My wife rises every few hours to nurse our infant, so these
Last Line: Robots with powerful beams of light
Subject(s): Television; Fathers & Daughters; Religion; Censorship; Cartoons & Cartoonists


CELESTIAL DESOLATIONS       
First Line: Glitter and gone- %is that wrong?
Last Line: The lute will leap %from the beautiful wound?


CELESTIAL DESOLATIONS; FOR MARJORIE SARGENT    Poem Text    
First Line: Now god wants even
Last Line: Thread by thread.
Subject(s): God; Life Change Events; Self-consciousness; Soul


CHANGE       
First Line: Circe was said to do that
Last Line: Horror she can't name %not circe, but her father


CHERRY ORCHARDS       
First Line: At dawn the dew was cold and thick
Last Line: Which rose all day above the trees


CLEAR NIGHT       
First Line: Trudging new snow to the shed
Last Line: Where lights shine: %neighbors, other lives


DAFFODIL POEM    Poem Text    
First Line: I remember the cloud on its blue bicycle
Last Line: Just as it began to snow.
Subject(s): Daffodils; Farewell; Man-woman Relationships; Parting; Male-female Relations


DARK PRAYER (1)       
First Line: Long before dawn, anxiety
Last Line: They are hard at work %making the world again from nothing


DARK PRAYER (2)       
First Line: Long before dawn, anxiety has me
Last Line: Those to whom I pray-- %powers invisible, hidden in wings
Subject(s): Nature


DO WORDS OUTLAST    Poem Text     Recitation by Author
Subject(s): Language; Words; Vocabulary


DOMESTIC LIFE: 1. TODAY    Poem Text    
First Line: Open yourself up: today
Last Line: Except cold inside.
Subject(s): Domestic Relations; Emptiness; Man-woman Relationships; Male-female Relations


DOMESTIC LIFE: 2. SOMETHING    Poem Text    
First Line: Something is burning inside you
Last Line: Of smoke on the snow.
Subject(s): Pain; Suffering; Misery


DOMESTIC LIFE: 3. BEFORE DAWN    Poem Text    
First Line: Your wife left before you woke
Last Line: Burns less brightly.
Subject(s): Domestic Relations; Grief; Loss; Love - Loss Of; Marriage; Sorrow; Sadness; Weddings; Husbands; Wives


DOMESTIC LIFE: 4. THE WATERFALL    Poem Text    
First Line: Failing to hold on to things
Last Line: All his furniture.
Subject(s): Domestic Relations; Men; Waterfalls


DOMESTIC LIFE: 5. FALL CLEANING    Poem Text    
First Line: This morning, the almost weightless bodies
Last Line: And out into the autumn woods.
Subject(s): Domestic Relations


DOOR       
First Line: A little wall of wood that gives
Last Line: No phantom but a living thing


ELEGY FOR A CHILD    Poem Text    
First Line: Here are consoling pieties
Subject(s): Death – Children


ELEGY: 1. A GRAVE RUBBING       
First Line: You place the paper against
Last Line: Dates and a name


ELEGY: 2. LIFE MASK       
First Line: That cast of keat's face
Last Line: Whose flesh is nothing now


ELEGY: 3. CHILD'S GAME       
First Line: What I want is %to preserve my friend
Last Line: The landscape smooth and blank


ELEGY; FOR JAMES WRIGHT    Poem Text    
First Line: Not only doesn't the ohio
Last Line: In rags, half in radiance.
Subject(s): Chestnut Trees; Death; Grief; Hudson River; Nature; Ohio River; Plane Trees; Rivers; Dead, The; Sorrow; Sadness; Sycamores


END OF AUGUST       
First Line: We left our rented farmhouse for three weeks


EVERYTHING; FOR MY MOTHER       
First Line: Is this all life is then
Last Line: Everything were under water.
Subject(s): Breath; Death; Life; Sickness; Dead, The; Illness


FAR BELOW, PLOWED FIELDS...    Poem Text    
First Line: Far below, plowed fields vibrated
Last Line: An emptiness he could fill with song.
Variant Title(s): "far Below, Plowed Fields"";
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Love - Loss Of; Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


FATHER'S SONG    Poem Text     Recitation
First Line: Yesterday, against admonishment
Last Line: She tries to teach me risk.
Subject(s): Children; Pain; Parents; Prudence; Childhood; Suffering; Misery; Parenthood; Caution


FIELDS TOOK ON...    Poem Text    
First Line: Fields took on their final
Last Line: With vanishing...
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Fields; Mythology - Classical; Orpheus; Pastures; Meadows; Leas


FRIDAY LUNCHBREAK    Poem Text    
First Line: At noon, still wearing their white
Last Line: And wrestle, angels of meat.
Subject(s): Beef; Calves; Factories; Food & Eating; Labor & Laborers; Work; Workers


FULL MOON       
First Line: Projector's beam
Last Line: To cast shadows on the blank screen?


GATHERING THE BONES TOGETHER; FOR PETER ORR    Poem Text    
First Line: When all the rooms of the house
Last Line: That arches toward the other shore.
Subject(s): Brothers; Death; Family Life; Fathers & Sons; Fratricide; Hunting; Half-brothers; Dead, The; Relatives; Hunters


GETTING DRESSED       
First Line: In the morning, I pull on
Last Line: That wants to swallow you.
Subject(s): Clothing & Dress


GLUKUPIKRON; TO SAPPHO    Poem Text    
First Line: Word you created / which we translate
Last Line: Your word for love.
Subject(s): Language; Love - Nature Of; Pain; Pleasure; Words; Vocabulary; Suffering; Misery


GOING OUT    Poem Text    
First Line: You hold your hands up to the light
Last Line: We stand in it like a room.
Subject(s): Dinners & Dining; Hunger; Longing


HAITI, 1961       
First Line: My mother writes her dearest friend
Last Line: So loud that shouting a foot apart %you can't be heard


HAS THE MOON BEEN UP THERE?    Poem Text    
Last Line: Who has abandoned whom?
Subject(s): Moon


HEART    Poem Text    
First Line: Its hinges rustless, / restless; opening / and shutting on trust
Last Line: To hive our dust!
Subject(s): Bodies; Hearts; Love; Trust


HERE    Poem Text    
First Line: Here's green, here's the tree
Last Line: What we are.
Subject(s): Grief; Nature; Sorrow; Sadness


HINGE       
First Line: On it the whole world turns
Last Line: Though it's only the breeze


HIS DREAM: THE BLACK TREE/THIRST       
First Line: I saw her, out past the first
Last Line: "from what deep well."
Variant Title(s): His Dream: The Black Tree/ Thirst
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


HIS GRIEF    Poem Text    
First Line: With my words / I'll make rocks
Last Line: To make them sing.
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Grief; Mythology - Classical; Orpheus; Tears; Sorrow; Sadness


HIS LAMENT    Poem Text    
First Line: How is it she lies here
Last Line: Could pearl a piece of dust.
Subject(s): Death; Eurydice (nymph); Lament; Love - Loss Of; Mythology - Classical; Orpheus; Dead, The


HORSES       
First Line: I brace my knee against
Last Line: Heaving between my thighs.
Subject(s): Animals; Barns; Horses


HOTEL ST. LOUIS, NEW YORK CITY, FALL 1969       
First Line: When I went inside, the manager said, `you don't want to live
Last Line: Sunday mornings, a bright orange football helmet that glowed like the sun.
Subject(s): Hotels; New York City; Survival; Inns; Innskeepers; Motels; Boarding Houses; Manhattan; New York, New York; The Big Apple


HOUSE OF CHILDHOOD       
First Line: From her sewing nook, nothing finished
Last Line: Wanted love live out their lives
Subject(s): Mythology - Classical; Penelope (mytholgy)


HOUSE OF CHILDHOOD       
First Line: From her sewing nook, nothing finished
Last Line: Where those from whom you wanted love %live out their lives


HOW EASY TO GIVE UP HOPE    Poem Text    
Last Line: How much they loved the world
Subject(s): Hope


I FOUND A BIRD       
First Line: In the old story %the children in the forest
Last Line: Once, who am now almost %and old man, and frightened?


I KNOW NOW THE BELOVED    Poem Text    


I WANT TO GO BACK    Poem Text    
Last Line: Isn't that a wound?
Subject(s): Boys; Children; Farm Life; Nature; Seasons; Swamps


I WAS MOVING ...       
First Line: I was moving down the bank / toward the boat, lost
Last Line: Chin propped on fists, listening.
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Music & Musicians; Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


I'VE KNOWN GRIEF    Poem Text    
Last Line: That cold wind into song
Subject(s): Grief


IF THERE'S A GOD...    Poem Text    
First Line: If there's a god of amphetamine, he's also the god of wrecked
Last Line: "laughing at all who stumble. Put out your tongue and receive it."
Subject(s): Death; Fathers & Sons; God; Medicine; Unfaithfulness; Dead, The; Drugs, Prescription; Infidelity; Adultery; Inconstancy


IF YOUR GAZE TAKES IN    Poem Text    
First Line: When they said I must leave hell
Last Line: Alive inside me.
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


IN HAITI: 1. SUNSET AT DESCHAPELLES       
First Line: From the houses of american engineers
Last Line: Red ants gather on a lizard's eye.
Subject(s): Evening; Haiti; Sunset; Twilight


IN HAITI: 2. AT THE SPRING       
First Line: I am the boy perched in the high
Last Line: Thigh-deep in a limestone cliff.
Variant Title(s): Haitian Suite
Subject(s): Boys; Girls; Haiti; Spring; Youth


IN HAITI: 3. BOY ON THE REEF/INFINITY OF DESIRE       
First Line: Three feet below his belly, the reef's
Last Line: Sea fans, past conchs pink as cunts.
Subject(s): Coral; Desire; Haiti; Sea; Ocean


IN HAITI: 4. THE PALACE OF SANS SOUCI       
First Line: A mapou's massive trunk
Last Line: I call and call.
Subject(s): Courts & Courtiers; Haiti


IN HAITI: 5. HOPITAL ALBERT SCHWEITZER; DESCHAPELLES, HAITI       
First Line: I pass the old beggar who sits
Last Line: Of haiti under my small straw hat.
Subject(s): Death; Haiti; Mothers; Sickness; Dead, The; Illness


IN MY DREAM    Poem Text    
First Line: In my dream, she was tired
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


IN MY DREAM       
First Line: In my dream, she was tired
Last Line: In the hill's shadow %which she had become
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


IN THE ART MUSEUM       
First Line: To the guard I'm probably only another oaf from the sticks, one of
Last Line: The dust that rises from them turns to gold in the air
Subject(s): Museums


IN THE HOUSE OF ORPHANS       
First Line: Their father gone since dawn
Last Line: It will bring them back again


IS THIS WHAT    Poem Text    


IS THIS WHAT       
Last Line: Deep cleft %lightning made
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


ISIS KNEELS    Poem Text    
First Line: Isis kneels on the banks / of the nile. She is assembling
Last Line: As if the world were about to speak
Subject(s): Mythology - Classical; Nile (river)


IT HURT ME TO HEAR...       
First Line: It hurt me to hear my subjects
Last Line: Dawn's chalk scraped across the board
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


IT'S NOT MAGIC    Poem Text    
Last Line: The smiling mouth
Subject(s): Love


IT'S WINTER...       
First Line: It's winter. Wind gnaws %a bone sky
Last Line: A stubborn %leaf in a bare shrub
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


LEAVING THE ASYLUM    Poem Text    
First Line: The metal harps of the high gates
Last Line: I love its glint among the dust and stones.
Subject(s): Change; Hospitals; Insanity; Introspection; Self-reliance; Madness; Mental Illness


LET'S REMAKE THE WORLD    Poem Text    
First Line: Between the warm wind's
Last Line: Who was gazing at us
Subject(s): Language


LIKE ANY OTHER MAN    Poem Text    
First Line: I was born with a knife
Last Line: Unlocked my body.
Subject(s): Change; Happiness; Man-woman Relationships; Men; Salvation; Joy; Delight; Male-female Relations


LINES WRITTEN IN DEJECTION, OKLAHOMA    Poem Text    
First Line: I have never lived on the reservation
Last Line: Lifts his pony, flings it at the moon.
Subject(s): Native Americans; Oklahoma; Solitude; Indians Of America; American Indians; Indians Of South America; Loneliness


LOOK, THEY DESCEND    Poem Text    


LOOK, THEY DESCEND       
Last Line: Settle and sink, %even the flowers bow
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


LOOKING BACK    Poem Text    
First Line: Marble pillars / of palace
Variant Title(s): In The Meadow
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


LOOKING BACK       
First Line: Marble pillars %of palace
Last Line: Of sunlight with %tiny golden hooks
Variant Title(s): In The Meado
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


LOSS       
First Line: Loss more than leaves
Last Line: Is carved in bark, in bone
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


LOVE POEM    Poem Text    
First Line: A black biplane crashes through the window
Last Line: A telephone number: yours.
Subject(s): Aviation & Aviators; Love


MAENADS       
First Line: The maenads came to me
Last Line: Till the heart is gnawed through
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


MAKING BEASTS    Poem Text    
First Line: When I was about ten
Last Line: On the feet I never gave it.
Subject(s): Children; Creative Ability; Thought; Childhood; Inspiration; Creativity; Thinking


MANHATTAN ISLAND POEM    Poem Text    
First Line: Thin river woman with a concrete star
Last Line: At night I am a jar of fireflies dying.
Subject(s): New York City; Manhattan; New York, New York; The Big Apple


MEADOW IN SPRING       
First Line: Between the warm wind's
Last Line: The soggy tombstone %of a mattress %lovers dragged here %summers ago
Subject(s): Nature


MEMORIAL DAY    Poem Text    
First Line: After our march from the hudson to the top
Last Line: Ticks on its chain.
Subject(s): Holidays; Honor; Memorial Day; Veterans; War; Declaration Day


MORNING SONG    Poem Text    
First Line: Sun on his face wakes him
Last Line: Pierce a magician's box.
Subject(s): Boys; Deer; Farm Life; Morning; Agriculture; Farmers


MOTORCYCLE       
First Line: Twenty years ago, zipping
Last Line: That now dries its wings, %prepares its shrill cry


MUSE OF MIDNIGHT       
First Line: In the street, stars collide
Last Line: Toward its target: a room in flames.
Subject(s): Muses; Night; Bedtime


MY BODY WAS NEVER MARRED    Poem Text    


MY FATHER'S VOICE    Poem Text    
First Line: Even as I rage, I see my daughter
Last Line: Weathers the shaping blast.
Subject(s): Anger; Children; Discipline; Fathers; Childhood


NIGHT JOURNEY       
First Line: I leave the house
Last Line: Bursts into flame
Subject(s): Farewell; Corpses


NIGHT JOURNEY       
First Line: I leave the house
Last Line: In the thornbush %bursts into flame


NO POSTMORTEMS        Recitation by Author
Subject(s): Memory


NOTHING AND THE INCIDENT IN THE STREETS    Poem Text    
First Line: Nothing forced those kids
Last Line: Will be their voice.
Subject(s): Nothingness; Social Protest; Tiananmen Square Incident, 1989; Universities & Colleges; Youth; Nihilism; Voids


NOVEMBER    Poem Text    
First Line: Unable to sleep, I spend the predawn hours
Last Line: Shapes in the frost like hopeful boats.
Subject(s): Bible; Desire; God; November; Plato (428-348 B.c.)


OCTOBER    Poem Text    
First Line: At my feet the stream flows backwards
Last Line: Only larger, like two wings of ice.
Subject(s): Fear; October; Self


ON A HIGHWAY EAST OF SELMA, ALABAMA; JULY 1965    Poem Text    
First Line: As the sheriff remarked: I had no business being there. He was
Last Line: And still he refuses to swallow.
Subject(s): African Americans; Mississippi; Prisons & Prisoners; Racism; Selma, Alabama; Negroes; American Blacks; Racial Prejudice; Bigotry


ONCE THE TWO OF US    Poem Text    


ORIGIN OF THE MARBLE FOREST    Poem Text    
First Line: Childhood dotted with bodies
Last Line: Make them stay, make them stone.
Subject(s): Children; Past; Childhood


ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE    Poem Text    
First Line: They've just made love
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE       
First Line: They've just made love
Last Line: Away and enter the dark %tunnel of trees, humming a tune %he'll soon put words to
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


ORPHEUS DESCENDING       
First Line: Before we lay together %in the fragrant
Last Line: Lost, %unless I bring her back
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


ORPHEUS STOOD IN THE DARK...       
First Line: Orpheus stood %in the dark hall
Last Line: He only had to turn %and she was there
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


PARADISE    Poem Text    
First Line: Life is random as a rolled pair of dice
Last Line: Love life's randomness: the rolled pair of dice.
Subject(s): Chance; Heaven; Human Behavior; Life; Paradise; Conduct Of Life; Human Nature


PARADISE LIGHT: ZIP ZAP    Poem Text    
First Line: The lightning stroke
Last Line: And debris is aftermath
Subject(s): Heaven; Lightning


PARADISE LIGHTNING DAZZLE: 1. PARADISE    Poem Text    
First Line: Pleasure space crammed
Last Line: That makes me long for more.
Subject(s): Heaven; Pleasure; Paradise


PARADISE LIGHTNING DAZZLE: 2. TOO BRIGHT    Poem Text    
First Line: One step beyond
Last Line: It lives, or dies?
Subject(s): Heaven; Light; Paradise


PARADISE LIGHTNING DAZZLE: 3. FULLNESS    Poem Text    
First Line: Fullness--the overmuch--
Last Line: With the overflow of sight.
Subject(s): Fullness; Heaven; Satiation; Paradise


PARADISE LIGHTNING DAZZLE: 4. BOTH    Poem Text    
First Line: I've been the pear's
Last Line: Than they can bear.
Subject(s): Heaven; Paradise


PARADISE LIGHTNING DAZZLE: 5. ALMOST A LONELINESS    Poem Text    
First Line: One and by one
Last Line: Bows them down.
Subject(s): Heaven; Solitude; Paradise; Loneliness


PARADISE LIGHTNING DAZZLE: 6. YES    Poem Text    
First Line: Burden and blessing--
Last Line: In this radiant wilderness.
Subject(s): Blessings; Heaven; Life; Paradise


PARADISE LIGHTNING DAZZLE: 7. TO SAY       
First Line: To say `now' and yet again
Last Line: With its redolent folds.
Subject(s): Flowers; Heaven; Roses; Time; Paradise


PARADISE LIGHTNING DAZZLE: 8. EQUIVALENTS       
First Line: Here's `bride' and `bridge,'
Last Line: The crashing cataract spews.
Subject(s): Equality; Heaven; Language; Paradise; Words; Vocabulary


PARADISE LIGHTNING DAZZLE: 9. THIS DAZZLE    Poem Text    
First Line: Was it only
Last Line: Radiant labyrinth?
Subject(s): Heaven; Introspection; Self; Paradise


PARADISE LIGHTNING DAZZLE: BLUE PENINSULA    Poem Text    
Last Line: Above / dazzled battlements
Subject(s): Chaos; Heaven; Love; Paradise


PATH       
First Line: It doesn't go anywhere
Last Line: Of his daughters running %a path he made


PENELOPE/THE WHITE DOOR       
First Line: Sometimes when I'm beyond hope
Last Line: Sometimes when I'm beyond hope
Subject(s): Penelope (mythology)


PENELOPE/THE WHITE DOOR       
First Line: Sometimes when I'm beyond hope
Last Line: Into the dazzling light of the next


PHOTO OF MY MOTHER IN HAITI       
First Line: The journey continued
Last Line: Glad for the chance %to catch our breath


POEM    Poem Text    
First Line: The truth's in myth not fact
Last Line: How bees made honey in a skull.
Subject(s): Introspection; Life


POEM ABOUT NOTHING    Poem Text    
First Line: When I was young / I fell in love / with nothing
Last Line: And we lack for nothing.
Subject(s): Grief; Nothingness; Youth; Sorrow; Sadness; Nihilism; Voids


READING LATE IN THE COTTAGE    Poem Text    
First Line: There aren't that many pages left
Last Line: Insect trapped in the lightbulb.
Subject(s): Books; Houses; Reading


RED T-SHIRT WITH POETRY EMBLAZONED IN BLOCK LETTERS...       
First Line: No doubt joseph's subtle
Last Line: Where the mysteries fuse: %a mememto mori peekaboo


REFUSING    Poem Text    
First Line: Refusing the invitation
Subject(s): Politics & Government; War


REFUSING       
First Line: Refusing the invitation
Last Line: For fear of war's imminence
Subject(s): Politics; War


SADNESS IS THERE TOO    Poem Text    
Last Line: What would we drink?
Subject(s): Grief; Death


SCARLET T-SHIRT: THE LYRIC MUSE       
First Line: I know I'm vulgar, but so
Last Line: And will not let it rest
Subject(s): Clothing & Dress; Taste (esthetics)


SCARLET T-SHIRT: THE LYRIC MUSE       
First Line: I know I'm vulgar, but so %was noble catullus
Last Line: And will not let it rest


SEARCH       
First Line: All night you search for them
Last Line: No one had warmed it %in a thousand years


SELF-PORTRAIT AT TWENTY    Poem Text    
First Line: I stood inside myself
Last Line: And the rain came.
Subject(s): Introspection; Self-hate; Self-pity


SHAKY SPECTRUM    Poem Text    
First Line: Here's 'anguish' and over
Last Line: Wait till the beast's asleep.
Subject(s): Hearts; Love - Complaints


SHE PAUSED       
First Line: On the path down, %she paused at the stone
Last Line: A mortal's a blossom %the earth opens for
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


SILENCE    Poem Text    
First Line: The way the word sinks
Last Line: Parachuting toward earth.
Subject(s): Silence


SINGING THE PAIN BACK INTO THE WOUND    Poem Text    
First Line: I crouch naked at the wound's edge
Last Line: Bundle on its back.
Subject(s): Pain; Suffering; Misery


SOLITARY CONFINEMENT; HAYNEVILLE, ALABAMA, 1965    Poem Text    
First Line: Even as the last bars clang
Last Line: In the magnolia across the moonlit road.
Subject(s): Alabama; Prisons & Prisoners; Solitude; Loneliness


SOME PART OF THE LYRIC    Poem Text    
First Line: Some part of the lyric wants to exclude
Last Line: Reflects the world it meant to exclude.
Subject(s): Earth; Grief; Poetry & Poets; World; Sorrow; Sadness


SOME SAY YOU'RE LUCKY    Poem Text    
Last Line: Where the beloved is born
Subject(s): Luck; Poetry & Poets


SONG: EARLY DEATH OF THE MOTHER    Poem Text    
First Line: The last tear turns
Last Line: Kingdom is born.
Subject(s): Children; Death; Mothers & Sons; Mourning; Childhood; Dead, The; Bereavement


SUSPICIONS       
First Line: If you wander in the market
Last Line: When she's talked with other men


TABLEAU VIVANT    Poem Text    
First Line: It's the scene where hector, reluctant
Last Line: Taller than he is.
Subject(s): Marriage; Soldiers; Weddings; Husbands; Wives


THE BELOVED IS DEAD    Poem Text    
First Line: The beloved is dead. Limbs
Subject(s): Death; Dead, The


THE BRAVE CHILD    Poem Text    
First Line: How, on a dare, he would dive where the stream
Last Line: Fall through the dust-filled air.
Subject(s): Adventure And Adventurers; Children; Religion; Childhood; Theology


THE BRIDGE    Poem Text    
First Line: In the dawn light these white girders
Last Line: Return to yourself.
Subject(s): Bodies; Bridges; Death; Dead, The


THE BUILDERS; FOR TRISHA    Poem Text    
First Line: Midnight: the field becomes white stone
Last Line: But filled with light.
Subject(s): Buildings & Builders


THE CITY OF SALT    Poem Text    
First Line: In the sun-drenched
Last Line: And sweet to taste.
Subject(s): Cities; Mothers; Salt; Urban Life


THE DEMONSTRATION    Poem Text    
First Line: They bob above us all afternoon
Last Line: Their spells had summoned up.
Subject(s): Civil Rights Movement; Conventions; Democratic Party (u.s.); Elections; Protest, Social; Racism; Assemblies; Meetings; Voting; Voters; Suffrage; Racial Prejudice; Bigotry


THE DINNER    Poem Text    
First Line: I invited mozart to dinner
Last Line: "if you can't take it?"
Subject(s): Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus (1756-1791)


THE DOLL    Poem Text    
First Line: I carry you in a glass jar
Last Line: Dead child.
Subject(s): Death - Children; Dolls; Toys; Death - Babies


THE ENTRANCE TO UNDERWORLD    Poem Text    
First Line: A common enough mistake
Last Line: At her first touch?
Variant Title(s): The Entrance To The Underworld
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus; Solitude; Loneliness


THE EXCAVATION    Poem Text    
First Line: In this dry, stubble field
Last Line: In this dry, stubble field.
Subject(s): Archeology; Artifacts; Curiosities & Wonders; Fathers; Native Americans; Old Age; Indians Of America; American Indians; Indians Of South America


THE FIRE HYDRANT       
First Line: Little stump of a thing stuck on the curb of my street: dull as bark
Last Line: Eurydice.
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


THE GHOSTS LISTEN TO ORPHEUS SING    Poem Text    
First Line: He stood before the throne
Last Line: The deep bursting emptiness of song.
Variant Title(s): Betrayals/hades, Eurydice, Orpheus
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Harps; Loss; Musical Instruments; Mythology - Classical; Orpheus; Lyres


THE GIFT; FOR MY DAUGHTER       
First Line: Scissors, glue, clumsy
Last Line: Each beat a breath.
Subject(s): Fathers & Daughters; Gifts & Giving


THE GIRL WITH EIGHTEEN NIGHTGOWNS    Poem Text    
First Line: And each one to the advantage of her breasts
Last Line: That only come out at night.
Subject(s): Breasts; Clothing & Dress; Girls; Night; Bedtime


THE GRAY FOX       
First Line: Someone I know is dying, at seventeen
Last Line: Watch him, ten yards away, unafraid.
Subject(s): Death; Foxes; Nature; Youth; Dead, The


THE HAND: 'BRIGHTNESS FALLS FROM THE AIR'    Poem Text    
First Line: Maybe you thought it was a bird


THE HAND: BRIGHTNESS FALLS FROM THE AIR    Poem Text    
First Line: Maybe you thought it was a bird


THE HATS    Poem Text    
First Line: The hats are hungry
Last Line: Has it been fed?
Subject(s): Hats; Jokes


THE HINGE    Poem Text    
First Line: On it the whole world turns
Subject(s): Doors


THE JOURNEY; FOR JANE KENYON (1947-1995)       
First Line: Beside me on the plane
Last Line: Calling its petals home.
Subject(s): Flowers; Poetry & Poets


THE KNOWN GRIEF    Poem Text    
First Line: I've known grief. I don't
Last Line: That cold wind into song
Subject(s): Grief


THE LOST CHILDREN    Poem Text    
First Line: Years ago, as dusk seeped from the blue
Last Line: Eidolons, adrift on the night air.
Subject(s): Children; Games; Loss; Play; Childhood; Recreation; Pastimes; Amusements


THE MAENADS       
First Line: The maenads came to me
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


THE POEM WRITTEN ON THE BODY    Poem Text    
Last Line: Death looks there, but we are here
Subject(s): Poetry & Poets; Death; Love; Life


THE POND    Poem Text    
First Line: Snapping turtles in the pond eat bass, sunfish
Last Line: And the steel hook wrenched straight as a pin.
Subject(s): Lakes; Nature; Turtles; Pools; Ponds; Tortoises


THE RIVER    Poem Text    
First Line: I felt both pleasure and a shiver
Last Line: We'd found by plunging into the wild river.
Subject(s): Bodies; Desire; Man-woman Relationships; Pleasure; Rivers; Swimming & Swimmers; Male-female Relations; Swimmers


THE ROOM    Poem Text    
First Line: With crayons and pieces of paper
Last Line: The white room swallowing what was passed.
Subject(s): Imagination; Rooms; Fancy


THE SWEATER    Poem Text    
First Line: I will lose you. It is written
Last Line: His death into the sweater.
Subject(s): Clothing & Dress; Loss; Travel; Journeys; Trips


THE TALK; FOR MY FATHER    Poem Text    
First Line: How many years we've circled round this date
Last Line: And talk at last, though all our talk's too late.
Subject(s): Cancer (disease); Fathers & Sons; Fear; Procrastination; Talk


THE THINGS THAT DIE    Poem Text    
Subject(s): Immortality; Love – Nature Of


THE VASE    Poem Text    
First Line: Boredom and terror, and the older
Last Line: And green, exotic birds in flight.
Subject(s): Boredom; Introspection; Life; Terror; Vases; Ennui


THE VOYAGES       
First Line: It's late when I try to sleep, resting
Last Line: We need our ignorance to keep us brave.
Subject(s): Pregnancy


THE WEDGE    Poem Text    
First Line: When there were two of us
Last Line: Will only bruise.
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Grief; Love - Loss Of; Mythology - Classical; Orpheus; Sorrow; Sadness


THE WEEDS    Poem Text    
First Line: On the lawn, beside the red house
Last Line: In the dusk of late summer.
Subject(s): Gardens & Gardening; Mothers & Sons; Plants; Weeds; Planting; Planters


THE WESTERN INVENTION OF LYRICAL NATURE    Poem Text    
First Line: And there's petrarch, our first
Last Line: Biting his lip, he tastes the sea.
Subject(s): Petrarch (1304-1374); Francesco Petrarca


THEN    Poem Text    
First Line: My parents and the parents
Subject(s): Parents; Women; Parenthood


THERE    Poem Text    
First Line: When trakl crossed over, the angels
Last Line: Carved on a stone cheek.
Subject(s): Death; Grief; Heaven; Poetry & Poets; Trakl, Georg (1887-1914); Dead, The; Sorrow; Sadness; Paradise


THIS IS WHAT WAS BEQUEATHED US    Poem Text    
Subject(s): Funerals; Burials


THREE SMALL SONGS       
First Line: A shaft of wind
Last Line: Against the dark earth


THREE SONGS: 3. SONG OF THOMAS, CALLED 'THE DOUBTER'    Poem Text    
First Line: Show me, I said, what


TIN CUP       
First Line: Here's a tin cup
Last Line: And even hell is holy.
Subject(s): Grief; Sorrow; Sadness


TO BE ALIVE    Poem Text     Recitation by Author
First Line: To be alive: not just the carcass
Subject(s): Conduct Of Life; Poetry & Poets


TOMB OF ORPHEUS       
First Line: My limbs were scattered
Last Line: She was the fern
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Graves; Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


TRANSIENTS WELCOME    Poem Text    
First Line: To be like the water


TRISTAN AND ISEULT       
First Line: Tristan and iseult had nothing
Last Line: Descending to kiss my wrists.
Subject(s): Hate; Longing; Love


TWO LINES FROM THE BROTHERS GRIMM; FOR LARRY AND JUDY RAAB    Poem Text    
First Line: Now we must get up quickly
Last Line: Move about, lighting the stove.
Subject(s): Escapes; Fairy Tales; Grimm, Jacob Ludwig Carl (1785-1863); Grimm, Wilhelm Carl (1786-1859); Fugitives


TWO SONGS OF THE RIVER    Poem Text    
First Line: At night angry survivors
Subject(s): Rivers; Death; Dead, The


UNDER PRESSURE       
First Line: It had to do with yellow poplar leaves
Last Line: Of air might breathe, air I could swim to


VISITOR       
First Line: Dionysus with lifted winecup
Last Line: How dark %it is; how far you are from shore


VISITOR       
First Line: Where the spruce wood ends, I step


WARNED HIS SONG... (DEATH OF ORPHEUS)       
First Line: Warned his song could tame
Last Line: And threw it in the river %but it would not sink
Subject(s): Death; Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


WAS ALL...       
First Line: Was all malevolence and planned, %or just a spectacle of clumsy
Last Line: Just one insignificant part %of the world's bad dream


WASHING MY FACE    Poem Text    
First Line: Last night's dreams disappear
Last Line: A transparent rose swallowed by its stem.
Subject(s): Dreams; Faces; Introspection; Past; Nightmares


WE MUST MAKE A KINGDOM OF IT    Poem Text    
First Line: So that a colony will breed here
Last Line: The gravedigger's shoulder.
Subject(s): Desire; Man-woman Relationships; Male-female Relations


WE'VE COME    Poem Text    
First Line: Calm now, curled away / from each other, backs
Last Line: Joined at the base of the spine
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


WE'VE COME       
First Line: Calm now, curled away %from each other, backs
Last Line: Joined at the base of the spine
Subject(s): Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus


WHAT I'M SAYING    Poem Text    
First Line: What I'm saying isn't exactly news
Last Line: Once you decide to live, you have to lose.
Subject(s): Life; Loss


WHAT IS LIFE    Poem Text     Recitation by Author
Subject(s): Life


WHEN EURYDICE SAW HIM    Poem Text    


WHEN I OPEN THE BOOK    Poem Text    
Last Line: Which raises green from the fallen seed
Subject(s): Poetry & Poets; Love; Language


WHEN I WAS ALIVE ...    Poem Text    
First Line: When I was alive--only glimpses
Last Line: Of my skin and stepped out?
Subject(s): Bodies; Death; Eurydice (nymph); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus; Soul


WHEN SAPPHO WROTE    Poem Text     Recitation by Author
Subject(s): Sappho (610-580 B.c.)


WHO WANTS TO LOSE THE WORTLD?    Poem Text    
Last Line: With the light of the v ital body
Subject(s): Life


WHO'D WANT TO BE A MAN       
First Line: With his heart
Last Line: And where is the rain?
Subject(s): Character; Grief; Men; Sorrow; Sadness


WHO'D WANT TO BE A MAN?       
First Line: With his heart %a black sack
Last Line: And where is the rain?


WILD HEART; FOR TRISHA    Poem Text    
First Line: Where would I be if not for your wild heart?
Last Line: How could I live? How could I make my art?
Subject(s): Art & Artists; Creative Ability; Hearts; Love; Man-woman Relationships; Muses; Inspiration; Creativity; Male-female Relations


WORK GLOVES; FOR BILL AND JON ORR    Poem Text    
First Line: All morning with gloved
Last Line: And breathe deeply.
Subject(s): Labor & Laborers; Work; Workers


YOU CAN READ THE WORLD    Poem Text    
Last Line: And what if that's not enough?
Subject(s): Language; Life