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Author: DOBYNS, STEPHEN Matches Found: 485 Dobyns, Stephen Poet's Biography 485 poems available by this author A PLACE IN MAINE Poem Text First Line: Shoebox upon shoebox - the elderly dawdle A SEPARATE TIME Poem Text First Line: In the years since I saw you on sunday ABSENCE First Line: If these lines that I Last Line: With the faces of strangers ADAM Poem Text First Line: It was something like a hole in the air Last Line: Wouldn't it be a weapon against all to come Subject(s): Bodies ADAM First Line: It was something like a hole in the air Subject(s): Bodies ADRIFT IN THE LEAFY TRANQUILITY First Line: After a dragon has been seen in the neighborhood Last Line: He would meet his fate boldly and keep his mouth shut AFTER THE WAR WITH THE ESKIMOS First Line: Having forced the peace, the eskimos Last Line: Our cousins half removed ALLEGORICAL MATTERS First Line: Let's say you are a man (some of you are) Last Line: Next time he wouldn't let it escape so easily ALLIGATOR DARK Poem Text First Line: Stiff as a fireman's spray, hisn urine smacks ALLIGATOR DARK First Line: Stiff as a fireman's spray, his urine smacks Last Line: Down to the alligator dark beneath the streets ALTHOUGH IN THE THICK OF A JOURNEY Last Line: Churns and plunges and goes no place ANCIENT TEACHING First Line: As he makes his steady way across the planet Last Line: He has tenderly surveyed her darkest corner ANGER First Line: I am the simplest of disguises. Last Line: Sulphur: strike him anywhere APHORISMS First Line: One was born with an intonation and went searching for a %language Last Line: By choosing praise over achievement, he made certain his %fame would end with his death ARRESTED SATURDAY NIGHT Poem Text First Line: This is how it happened: peg and rob had invited ART ET AL First Line: Four men shoot craps in an alley, crouched Last Line: Can art endure much longer? The cop thinks not ARTISTIC MATTERS First Line: The little killer must have his own room Last Line: You see? He has just written you this poem AT THE OCEAN HE STUDIED THE WAVES Last Line: Spaces between knowledge and unknowing AT THE OCEAN HE STUDIES THE WAVES Poem Text First Line: At the ocean he studied the waves – how they built and broke Last Line: That filled the spaces between knowledge and unknowing Subject(s): Waves AT TIMES HE TRIED TO LOCATE THE MOMENT OF CHANGE Last Line: Gate. By the time he was settled in his seat, his question would be %forgotten AT TIMES IT WAS IN FRENCH OR PAGES WERE MISSING Last Line: While he cursed himself and whipped himself after his ever- %plunging ambition BACH PARTIA OR ONE OF THE GOLDBERG VARIATIONS Last Line: Being outside of himself can he ever be within himself BAD LUCK FENCE First Line: Three jerks crack jokes on tv Last Line: And the fat boy croons to his chocolate, %oh, black flower, black flower %come put me in your power BEAUTY First Line: The father gets a bullet in the eye, killing him Last Line: As if that's what it means to govern your life by it BEING HAPPY First Line: A dog on a street corner sits on a soapbox Last Line: His paw. Afterward, they tip the busboy five bucks BELLY First Line: The belly puts on a bright red wig Last Line: Something like a hiccup, something like a sob Subject(s): Bodies BETWEEN HAMBURG AND BUENOS AIRES Poem Text First Line: Yesterday I took the dying taxicab that is my body BETWEEN THEM ROSE THE BONER OF CONTENTION First Line: Heart checks into a revitalization clinic Last Line: Would be milk or lemonade, fig newtons or ginger snaps BIRDSONG, SUNSETS Last Line: To confine them to the future as goals to work for, stratagems to %make him persevere BIRTH ANGELS First Line: The heavy-lidded enterprise of the dead Last Line: A sudden consciousness, the thrashing of wings Subject(s): Angels BIRTH REPORT First Line: The week the nuclear protesters stormed the gates Last Line: Red mouth -- tearing and rending, devouring its children BLACK DOG, RED DOG First Line: The boy waits on the top step, his hand on the door Last Line: Black dog, red dog -- now more despairing, more resolved BLACK GIRL VANISHING: DETROIT, 1970 First Line: When the truck crawled up from the river Last Line: Unable to hinder, unable to help: and still %the indifferent traffic keeps roaring past Subject(s): Bodies BLACK STITCHES DOWN THE MIDDLE First Line: While heart is at the butcher, a thief breaks Last Line: The benefit of his contorted smiles and people's sympathy BLEEDER First Line: By now I bet he's dead which suits me fine Last Line: Some new loser to link us in frailty again BODY OF ROMULUS First Line: The granular surface of the snow shines like parchment Last Line: Pieces of liver, the bright blue eyes of the god BODY'S CURSE First Line: Sad to say there's more than one--loneliness Last Line: Question the whole crazy and quarrelsome %conglomeration, and it says touch me Subject(s): Bodies BODY'S HOPE First Line: Whatever lifts the body up -- muscles Last Line: And the back door beckons and the peacocks cry Subject(s): Bodies BODY'S JOURNEY First Line: Born, it's not good for much, a vehicle Last Line: Its calming stroke and a loon warbles its cry? Subject(s): Bodies BODY'S JOY First Line: The slick kiss of an oyster slipping Last Line: A barn swallow that twists and flits, a bright %flung thing caught in the vanishing light Subject(s): Bodies BODY'S REPOSE AND DISCONTENT First Line: Sometimes the body needs to collect Last Line: Through discontent we make it go, just so %some god someplace can watch it sparkle Subject(s): Bodies BODY'S STRENGTH First Line: The mind may not mind death. It means Last Line: And no place left to get to Subject(s): Bodies BODY'S WEIGHT First Line: A bookcase has its books, a horse supports its rider Last Line: Or butterfly wings, and then the darkness begins Subject(s): Bodies BONEYARD First Line: These people in the future won't be like us Last Line: Black stumps, blackened foundations, %flat stones with people's names cut into them Subject(s): Bodies BOWLERS ANONYMOUS First Line: Here comes the woman who wears the plastic prick Last Line: Flickers, fades, and is never perfect again BRAVADO First Line: Smart, stupid -- let me tell you how to do it. Last Line: I've just shown you how to write one BRINK First Line: My son stands at the shore's lip Subject(s): Bodies BRINK First Line: My son stands at the shore's lip Last Line: And won't the story be repeated until we ourselves %take the page and tear it from the book? Subject(s): Bodies CAN POETRY MATTER? Poem Text First Line: Heart feels the time has come to compose lyric poetry. Subject(s): Poetry & Poets CAN POETRY MATTER? First Line: Heart feels the time has come to compose lyric poetry Last Line: Corn field, and two old dobbins pulling a buckboard of song CANTO HONDO First Line: For three days the goat was tied to the stoop Last Line: A long and perilous journey, and why should we %worry and feel sorry when he felt only pride? Subject(s): Bodies CARD GAME First Line: The boy has never known her not to cheat Last Line: Over her, keep his cat body nerby to protect her CAREERS First Line: How difficult it was to look at them Last Line: Those childless women from their chosen calling Subject(s): Bodies CECIL First Line: How calm is the spring evening, and the water CEMETERY NIGHTS First Line: Sweet dreams, sweet memories, sweet taste of earth Last Line: Will wake from sleep and perhaps bark back CEMETERY NIGHTS 2 First Line: Because the moon burns a bright orange Last Line: Hitting trees, clumps of earth; seeking marauders, %indians,pirates to kill just to protect her CEMETERY NIGHTS IV First Line: Betting on how many leaves cover a birch Last Line: And what dark fields would be his destination? CEMETERY NIGHTS V Poem Text First Line: Wheel of memory, wheel of forgetting, bitter CEMETERY NIGHTS V First Line: Wheel of memory, wheel of forgetting, bitter Last Line: Presses his mouth to the erect nipple CEZANNE AND THE LOVE OF COLOR Poem Text First Line: Because his wife refused to miss a dress fitting Last Line: Of color - true representatives of light and air Subject(s): Bodies; Cezanne, Paul (1839-1906) CEZANNE AND THE LOVE OF COLOR First Line: Because his wife refused to miss a dress fitting Last Line: Of color -- true representatives of light and air Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE AND ZOLA Poem Text First Line: At thirteen they were known as the inseparables Last Line: “all day,” a friend said, “we heard the sound of weeping.” Subject(s): Bodies; Cezanne, Paul (1839-1906); Zola, Emile (1840-1902) CEZANNE AND ZOLA First Line: At thirteen they were known as the inseparables Last Line: All day,' a friend said, 'we heard the sound of weeping.' Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S A MODERN OLYMPIA--1872 First Line: Most women frightened him, their breasts, their beauty Last Line: While before her on a pink sofa obviously at ease %rests cezanne himself unblushing and released Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S AMBITION First Line: He hungered for the fame of bouguereau Last Line: Of blue sky stretching above it -- oh, blessed escape Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S ANGER First Line: Around the building where he worked, a tangle Last Line: When he yanked open his windows and flung the ugly, %the slack or stupid canvas into the ravenous tr Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S COLDNESS First Line: Another person's hand upon his arm, the threat Last Line: Some scrap of self with anger. Better to loathe them. %better to spit or they'd stick their hooks in Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S DOUBTS First Line: He was a hard painter to pose for. Hours stuck Last Line: At the grim and outcast creature he had become Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S FAILURE First Line: His doubt made him impossible to live with Last Line: Before his senses, saying, 'I paint with pleasure %but lack the wealth of color that animates nature Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S FORTRESS First Line: His clothing smelled, he rarely washed, often grumbling Last Line: Of the artist himself. And the critics kept taunting: %'thetriflings of a savage, the daubs of a tra Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S LOVE OF POETRY First Line: Nearly friendless, with only a few years to live Last Line: Like what slips by and what one keeps painting for Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S MONTAGNE SAINTE-VICTOIRE First Line: Observing cezanne's paintings of this mountain Last Line: A slope-shouldered pile of stone, bald as a skull, %as if painting himself, painting his stony will Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S OUTRAGEOUSNESS First Line: Like a child,' mary cassatt said, describing Last Line: I am the only one alive who can paint a red Subject(s): Bodies; Cassatt, Mary (1844-1926); Cezanne, Paul (1839-1906); Paintings And Painters CEZANNE'S PORTRAITS First Line: In cezanne's portraits of his family it seems Last Line: To put down exactly, because wasn't it also his own: %the desire to escape his enemies, to be alone? Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S SECLUSION Poem Text First Line: I have begun to think,' he wrote in a late letter Last Line: Writing, “a vague sense of apprehesnion persists” Subject(s): Cezanne, Paul (1839-1906); Solitude CEZANNE'S SECLUSION First Line: I have begun to think,' he wrote in a late letter Last Line: Into an expression of tenderness, which he dismissed, %writing: 'a vague sense of apprehension persi Subject(s): Bodies CEZANNE'S SUCCESS Poem Text First Line: The girls he followed down the street, the heartbreaks Last Line: Stopped calling. Harsh wind at night , no loving hands Subject(s): Cezanne, Paul (1839-1906); Success CEZANNE'S SUCCESS First Line: The girls he followed down the street, the heartbreaks Last Line: Of mind. No jokes, no girls, no wine. The friends %stopped calling. Harsh wind at night, no loving h Subject(s): Bodies CHEAP VASE First Line: Pursued by threat of war and violence CHILDREN First Line: In the evening the couples came down Last Line: Are deserted. We were their future %and we have erased them from this earth Subject(s): Bodies CHOICES WERE BETWEEN HIS LIFE AND HIS ART Last Line: Dreams-a voice from his youth, an impractical voice CLOUDS Poem Text First Line: The clouds moved in another hundred feet Subject(s): Clouds CLOUDS First Line: The clouds moved in another hundred feet Last Line: To find something solid to hold on to CLOUDS ABOVE THE MOUNTAINS Last Line: Event already lost from memory COMMIUNITY First Line: Had it worked well even once? Can one point Last Line: Stamping and snarling and beating their chests CONFESSION First Line: The nazi within me thinks it's time to take charge Subject(s): Bodies CONFESSION First Line: The nazi within me thinks it's time to take charge Last Line: Not noisy. No singing, no dancing, no carrying on Subject(s): Bodies CONNECTIONS First Line: Two days of listening to a police radio Last Line: My lungs like a swimmer diving to the bottom CONSOLATIONS OF WATER Poem Text First Line: Picking your way barefoot across the parking lot to the beach Last Line: Soft hands seek to rub anger from stones Subject(s): Seashore; Water CONTINGENCIES Poem Text First Line: There is a picture, a french painting showing CONTINGENCIES First Line: There is a picture, a french painting, showing Last Line: A glass target among all things pointed and haphazard CONVIVIALITY OF COWS First Line: In the ungreased field they cling Last Line: Kicking soft hooves for company CORN TO POUND TO MAKE HIS BREAD First Line: Snakeroot, bloodroot, smartweed, nipplewort Last Line: With his dusty brogan, he adds: and ladies too, of course COUNTERPARTS Poem Text First Line: There is no sky today, echoes of birds COUNTERPARTS First Line: There is no sky today. Echoes of birds Last Line: Of summer. There are seasons no longer acceptable COUNTRY CLUB First Line: Among the yellow leaves of old oaks Last Line: Fattens above me feathered and huge COVETOUSNESS First Line: Keep your toys and small possessions Last Line: Dreaming you were me, sleeping with mine CRIMSON INVITATION First Line: More sex, more books, more cake, more murder Last Line: As the sun sank into the water as if for forever CROSSROADS First Line: Heights, I never climbed through windows. Last Line: These are directions you too must follow CUIADORES DE AUTOS First Line: It seems like the world's most useless profession -- Last Line: And grew confused with the pounding of my heart DANCE, DANCE Poem Text First Line: They have become quite a crowd: the ones Last Line: Your shadow plays in the light cast up by the world. Subject(s): Dancing & Dancers DANCE, DANCE First Line: They have become quite a crowd: the ones Last Line: Your shadow plays in the light cast up by the world Subject(s): Dancing And Dancers DANCING IN VACATIONLAND First Line: The people in the houses behind searsport are dancing Last Line: Vacationland world might stop spinning beneath them DARK AND TURBULENT SEA First Line: Sailboat, sailboat - so heart counts the ships at sea Last Line: Is he aware of the wintry weather's fierce attack? Guess not DAY THE WORLD ENDS First Line: The day on which the world ends will Last Line: The ring, drags down the already forsaken shade Subject(s): Bodies DAYTONA FRESH AND INDIANAPOLIS IMMACULATE First Line: Just as a long rainy night in winter softens the trees Last Line: Become one dollop of mush, one heap of chips, one dust DEAD BABY First Line: My great-aunt had a story she often repeated Last Line: Only to fail and feel it slip and fall away DEAD CURTAIN First Line: Sometimes late in the evening, I count the hairs Last Line: Trembles as somethng invisible slides through it DEAD POET HA HA First Line: The bird on the branch was singing of gladness Last Line: Inflaming the poet's farewell sparks my inspiration! DEAD ROPE Poem Text First Line: Chukka, chukka - so he repeats when the waitress DEAD ROPE First Line: Chukka, chukka-so he repeats when the waitress Last Line: Insult all the world with chukka, chukka, the creep? DEATH LOBS A BOSOM INTO THE FIELD First Line: Toys that bounce, toys that jingle, toys that go whizbang Last Line: A night bird trills, a bell chimes, cows shuffle back to the barn DELICATE, PLUMMETING BODIES First Line: A great cry went up from the stockyards and Last Line: Like a net to catch the delicate and plummeting bodies DELICIOUS MONSTROSITY First Line: With the flat side of white plastic spatulas Last Line: A little dance as he swiftly departs, licking %drops of blackberry jam from his unshaven lips Subject(s): Bodies DESIRE First Line: A woman in my class wrote that she is sick Subject(s): Bodies DESIRE First Line: A woman in my class wrote that she is sick Last Line: In the cell block, steel bolts sliding shut Subject(s): Bodies DETERMINATION TO WRITE Poem Text Subject(s): Writing & Writers DIGGING THE KNIFE DEEPER First Line: One crystal of salt on the tongue. It isn't hot Last Line: Of their complaint to make our evening more complete DO THEY HAVE A REASON? First Line: Life begins, you make some friends, %what futures you plan for one another Last Line: You love is changed for another, it's like that DOG-TIRED CANNON FODDER WON'T SALUTE First Line: At times romance has wrinkles which even heart Last Line: And why, asks heart, couldn't you have done that before? DOUBLE First Line: Arriving home late one night, a man Last Line: He dreams of fighting, he dreams of trucks %roaring their motors throughout the long night Subject(s): Bodies DREAM First Line: She dreams her girl loover steals toward her EBB TIDE First Line: In early morning the gulls flew down to make ECHOES First Line: With her tight black leotard a second skin Last Line: She turns and casts her eye, she finds hereself %answering back, lovingly and full of desire Subject(s): Bodies ENVY First Line: You invite me to a banquet in your honor Last Line: Is another reason to hate you ERSATZ METAPHYSIC OF COMMERCIALISM First Line: Heart wonders why he's such a sucker Last Line: Not a single vibration, all colors ashen, no horizon EXILE First Line: The time came for him to be released Last Line: The unruly fiction which he labored to believe Subject(s): Alienation (social Psychology); Dissenters; Exiles; Marginality, Social EXPANSION SLOTS First Line: The ground lies muddy and dark down here Last Line: His own death in moscow at the age of sixty-one-- %my friends, I wish you all long lives Subject(s): Bodies EXPLAINING THE NATURE OF EVIDENCE First Line: After the tables and chairs Last Line: You ask, what? You don't know who %I talk to, talking to you EYELIDS Poem Text First Line: Shy defiers of the existential world Last Line: This is the world to love. There is no other Subject(s): Bodies EYELIDS First Line: Shy defiers of the existential world Last Line: This is the world to love. There is no other Subject(s): Bodies FACE IN THE CEILING First Line: A man comes home to find his wife in bed Last Line: How ferociously %the great machines bear down upon them %andhow courageous it is for them to be ther FACES First Line: My daughter baby clio lies on her back Last Line: Of a thief, one with the face of her father FACING FAILURE First Line: Heart lies on on a board with his hands crossed Last Line: The knack to join the ranks of the ambulatory defunct FATAL KISSES First Line: Brutal lips, slasher lips -- as a stunned toddler Last Line: Your skull -- all that's left of course -- grins and grins FAVORITE IRAQI SOLDIER First Line: Into his kit when sent to the front he had tucked Last Line: To devour me when my days on earth are done FEAR First Line: His life frightened him. The sun in the sky Last Line: Over and over, biting and rending the night air FEET First Line: The brave, the beaten, the shameful ones Last Line: Contortion just right, imagining the audience's %final roar,the curtain descending on its chains Subject(s): Bodies FIGHTING BACK First Line: At times it seems to heart that the truck has left Last Line: With a washcloth over his brow and the music turned low FINDING THE DIRECTION Poem Text First Line: It is quiet. It is a place where FINGERNAILS First Line: Little excavators, postage stamps Last Line: While the silence answers with more silence %and a beetle shoves a pebble up a hill Subject(s): Bodies FLAWED LANGUAGE: THOUGHT'S SHADOW First Line: Love letters, heart is sick to death of love letters Last Line: Heart returns to common diction for his lovelorn fiction FLEAMARKEY First Line: A display of padlocks on a blanket on the sidewalk Last Line: The eye that surveys the dark and sees only itself Subject(s): Flea Markets FOLK TALES First Line: Sometimes looking over your shoulder Last Line: Lie unkissed in their beds, and all through %the city the lights are blinking out Subject(s): Bodies FOOTSTEP First Line: Each evening the man whose wife has gone Last Line: For too long had been unmoving and unchanged FOR ONE IT WAS THE WISH TO BE LOVED Last Line: Can't recall but which decides each day's action and worries him to %sleep at night FOR YEARS HE THOUGHT MADNESS MUST BE PEACEFUL Last Line: Rushing out of control, pistons rattling, metal fracturing, gobs of %oil flung off FRAGMENTS First Line: Now there is a slit in the blue fabric of air Last Line: Beautiful daughters and one has died FREIGHT CARS Poem Text Recitation First Line: Once, taking a train into chicago Subject(s): Bodies; Railroads; Railways; Trains FREIGHT CARS First Line: Once, taking a train into chicago Last Line: Come back, call home, we need you Subject(s): Bodies; Railroads FRENCHIE First Line: I was eating a chicken sandwich with mayonnaise Last Line: The left hand can't pretend it doesn't know the right FRIENDS OF HIS YOUTH Poem Text First Line: Friends of his youth, friends of his prime Subject(s): Friendship FRIENDS OF HIS YOUTH, FRIENDS OF HIS PRIME Last Line: Ultimate listener-would, with a sympathetic whistle, casually dis-perse FRIENDS WITH WHOM HE HAD QUARRELED Last Line: Road stretches ahead, indifferent and unexplored FROM THE INVISIBLES First Line: In copley square, the derelics sit side by side Last Line: Blazing up on a stack of old coats in copley square FUNCTIONAL FORGETTING Poem Text First Line: Here is the world, here the world's forgetting Last Line: With opportunity. Ah, death, unloose your thighs Subject(s): Forgetfulness FUNCTIONAL FORGETTING First Line: Here is the world, here the world's forgetting Last Line: With opportunity, ah, death, unloose your thighs Subject(s): Forgetfulness FUNERAL First Line: When her coffin had been carried from FUNNY First Line: These guys, it's hard to believe these guys Last Line: Fifty-year-old eyes. Now that's what I call funny FUTURE First Line: Next day, next week, next year Last Line: And just before it all becomes clear-- %safe at last, we shout, but is nobody there? Subject(s): Bodies GARDENER First Line: After the first astronauts reached heaven Last Line: Begged him for the chance to make it on their own GEESE First Line: As a green thread winds through blue fabric Last Line: On his arm, turning and finding himself alone GENERAL AND THE TANGO SINGER First Line: Some people put their trust in art, others Last Line: Fire toddles off to dreamland on a full stomach GENERAL MATTHEI DRIVES HOME THROUGH SANTIAGO Poem Text First Line: The part where general matthei leaves his office Subject(s): Matthei Aube, Fernando; Chile GENERAL MATTHEI DRIVES HOME THROUGH SANTIAGO First Line: The part where general matthei leaves his office Last Line: He will half roll and half shrug one of his shoulders %as if letting a heavy strap at last slide fro GETTING TOUGHER First Line: In the workshop for transitional children Last Line: Where the sun is rising and his friends waiting GETTING UP First Line: The cat with yellow eyes doesn't yet realize Last Line: And the cat takes a half-step, preparing to leap GIRL IN WHITE GIVER OF GIFTS First Line: I am the giver of gifts, the bringer of life Last Line: Is it the night, you sk? Now you understand me GLUTTONY First Line: My stomach is the sky Last Line: I am the island they see in the distance GOD'S POORER PARTICLE, I.E. THE DEVIL First Line: After heart's pal frank gets mushed in a car wreck Last Line: Must signify a sort of proof, but, of what, heart asks, of what? GOLDEN BROILERS First Line: What is it about how these chickens set Last Line: As he slaps the chicken's carcass across the counter GOOD DEEDS First Line: Heart sits on a stump in the backyard Last Line: The singing of formerly unheard birds grows audible GOODBYE TO THE HANDS THAT HAVE TOUCHED HIM First Line: Rocky roads, sleepless nights, heart decides Last Line: For breakfast he'll fry up a batch of dead poems GOTTERON LANDSCAPE First Line: The stark rock bulk of gotteron ravine rises Last Line: Winds him home through the rock bulk of gotteron ravine GRANDFATHER POEM First Line: He is something he is falling into: Last Line: Still echoing on what was never a funeral GREAT DOUBTERS OF HISTORY First Line: The woman who kicked out the back window Last Line: And no days off for your best behavior GREAT JOB First Line: Heart considers the nature of fairness Last Line: That he alone reaps the rewards of his manic guilt GREEDY CHILD First Line: Gripping the mantel with thick fingers Last Line: Wants to suck in all the rich and tasty world GRIEF First Line: Trying to remember you Last Line: My feet be severed from my body GUITAR LESSON First Line: Hand gripping the girl's thivh, pressed nearly upon Last Line: Teacher and all the tuneless world should thank her GUN First Line: Late afternoon light slices through the dormer window Last Line: This morning? Now it is smaller. Now it has gone away GUTTER TROUBLE First Line: Detritus in the roadway: litter, broken Last Line: I hoped to write woke me from the soundest sleep HARSH WORDS, DISMISSIVE GESTURES) Last Line: Situation? By which he meant life itself HE FELT BEST MOVING BETWEEN TWO POINTS Last Line: Never doubted his mastery HE FELT BULLIED BY HIS POSSESSIONS Last Line: Played on the mantel for a few weeks before being banished to the %attic? HE GREW FOND OF HIS UNCERTAINTIES Last Line: And whiskey-laden kisses. It's the only kiss that endures HE HAD SPENT HIS YOUTH Last Line: The world kept on as before with no memory of his footsteps or %desire HE KNEW HIS VULNERABILITIES Last Line: And accept those compromises which the day would force upon %him in return? HE KNEW HIS VULNERABILITIES, AND CONCEALED THEM Poem Text HE KNEW IT WAS FOOLISH Last Line: Before making his way home through the darkening city HE LOVED HIS JOY Last Line: Gone, rushing again through the capricious world HE LOVED THE GENERAL OVER THE PARTICULAR Last Line: Touching as he spun away to the silence of his life HE PRIDED HIMSELF ON HIS HONESTY Last Line: Resemblance to how he saw himself? It became the only self %he had HE TOLD HER, HE LOVED HER Poem Text First Line: Party all day, party all night-a man Last Line: Seeking out the face of his one true love Subject(s): Love - Erotic HE TOLD HER, HE LOVED HER First Line: Party all day, party all night-a man Last Line: Seeking out the features of his own true love Subject(s): Erotic Love HIDDEN WITHIN THE SLEEVES OF THOSE DARK ROBES First Line: If they had shape, how beautiful might be that shape Last Line: Our kind purpose enough, wasn't our love enough? %needle fingers, old needle fingers HIMALAYAS WITHIN HIM First Line: Heart worries about the sound of his own heartbeat Last Line: Artful coloration and his own heartbeat: constant and sly HIS DECISION First Line: After his stroke (it was a tiny one) Last Line: Of his choosing, he felt certain of it HIS DEFINITION OF BEAUTY Last Line: Drifts off on the least of air HIS FAILURES Poem Text First Line: His failures - could he blame them on time HIS FAILURES-COULD HE BLAME THEM ON TIME? Last Line: Him, soothed him and had never told the truth? HIS FAVORITE BLUE CUP Poem Text First Line: Over the years - and heart has had many years Last Line: I've been away, says heart, I've been away Subject(s): Memory HIS FAVORITE BLUE CUP First Line: Over the years - and heart has had many years Last Line: I've been away, says heart, I've been away Subject(s): Memory HIS LIFE WAS THE PRACTICE OF FORMING A SINGLE SENTENCE Poem Text Last Line: Evolution and release: a full life Subject(s): Conduct Of Life HIS WANT FORMED A CRAVING NEVER SATISFIED Last Line: Him and draw him within, then shut the light HOMERIC OFFERING First Line: Achilles leans back and strums his harp Last Line: Tell that to his victims. How would they react HOPELESS TOOLS First Line: These thorns that snatch at our sleeves Last Line: Sharpness only, joy of tearing and rending HOSPITAL WAITING ROOM First Line: Bald, yellow skinned, with only four Last Line: Whether to be lifted up with great rejoicing %or cast down as litter on a barber's floor Subject(s): Bodies HOW COULD YOU EVER BE FINE? Poem Text First Line: I dreamt last night I heard someone speak your name Last Line: People on hard streets dragged to inevitable ends. Subject(s): Bodies; Memory HOW COULD YOU EVER BE FINE? First Line: I dreamt last night I heard someone speak your name Last Line: On whom does it shine now, whom does it welcome? %people on hard streets dragged to inevitable ends Subject(s): Bodies HOW HE NURTURED HIS CYNICISM Last Line: Guard, the very sum of his cynicism, always it was the first to applaud his cunning HOW IT WAS AT THE END Poem Text First Line: The box was set in a hole in the ground Last Line: From the trees to that nothingness called eternity Subject(s): Bodies; Death HOW IT WAS AT THE END First Line: The box was set in a hole in the ground Last Line: From the trees to that nothingness called eternal Subject(s): Bodies HOW SWEET AND PROPER IT IS Poem Text First Line: Color of silver, surrounded by barbed wire HOW TO LIKE IT Poem Text Recitation by Author First Line: These are the first days of fall. The wind Subject(s): Animals; Dogs; Memory HOW TO LIKE IT First Line: These are the first days of fall. The wind Last Line: Answers to what comes next and how to like it Subject(s): Animals; Dogs; Memory HOW YOU ARE LINKED First Line: There are days when you wake and your body Last Line: The treasure, the curiosity you have passionately %tried to decipher for all the years of your life Subject(s): Bodies HUNTING DOGS PURSUE THE WOUNDED DEER First Line: Heart descends to hell to look for old friends Last Line: For a four leaf clover: a good-luck wish to save for later I'M MUSCLE, I'M BRAWN First Line: Hearing the pet shop has picked up a load of pups Last Line: That whiskey's smoky tang should overwhelm his tongue IN A ROW Poem Text Recitation First Line: The mailman handing me a letter Last Line: I paid for that one, that one belongs to me Subject(s): Money IN A ROW First Line: The mailman handing me a letter Last Line: I paid for that one, that one belongs to me Subject(s): Bodies IN SOME DREAMS HE COULD RUN Last Line: At times gaining entry, at times being turned away IN THE BEGINNING, HE WAS LIKE A CROWD Last Line: That's the one you see now, your final partner, no choice about it IN THE HOSPITAL First Line: He has refused absolution and moved piece by piece Last Line: In benediction. There a tree, there a river, there a tree INAPPROPRIATE GESTURES First Line: A butcher glances through a bank window and sees Last Line: Ties to the train tracks of tomorrow's locomotive Subject(s): Bodies INDIFFERENCE TO CONSEQUENCE First Line: Blossoms like the fluted bells Last Line: Roar your meager motor ever louder INVASIONS Poem Text First Line: The abrupt presentiment of illness Last Line: Waking in a house you thought was yours forever Subject(s): Bodies; Sickness; Family Life; Aging INVASIONS First Line: The abrupt presentiment of illness Last Line: Remember that time? A parade of bright mornings, %waking in a house you thought was yours forever Subject(s): Bodies IT WAS THE LACK OF CERTAINTY Poem Text IT WAS THE LACK OF CERTAINTY THAT DISTURBED HIM Last Line: And thank you, and even passed the roast beef IT'S LIKE THIS Poem Text First Line: Each morning the man rises from bed because the invisible IT'S LIKE THIS First Line: Each morning the man rises from bed because the invisible Last Line: Until at last I lift you up and wrap you within me IT'S NOT THE HOOKERS OR OPIUM DENS First Line: Heart decides that when you die your wrinkles Last Line: Unearthed ex-chums, the dear departed together again JAPANESE GIRL WITH RED TABLE First Line: The japanese girl thinks she will die today Last Line: Hopelessly to hold his cup steady and make no face JAPANESE GIRL WITH RED TABLE JONAH'S FLIGHT TO TARSHISH First Line: His mail, mostly bills, was already being forwarded Last Line: Heard a story, which they have chosen not to repeat KATIA READING First Line: The book is golden with an orange spine, and the girl Last Line: Who condemned to a room is at last free of the room KENTUCKY DERBY DAY, BELFAST, MAINE First Line: When I was twelve, I happened to guess the winning horse Last Line: No, just another damn fool who won't make up his mind LAST JUMPING JACKS First Line: Heart deliberates upon the end of the world Last Line: Before the power is cut - still burning, still bright Subject(s): Death; Hearts LAUGHTER First Line: As a pair of hands can stretch a rubber band Last Line: Black shapes grouped in winter trees, %trying to snatch something of their lives back Subject(s): Bodies LEARNING TO THINK First Line: My stepdaughter tells of voices in her head LEAVING THE BAR AND LOW LIFE AT CLOSING, I UNSUCCESSFULLY First Line: Keep your laughter to yourself, dixieland band. Last Line: Ever told me there were streets like these LET'S PEEK AT THE DENTAL WORK First Line: Whoops, heart loses a tooth, then another Last Line: Drinks with a straw, hides his teeth lest trouble starts LETTER BEGINNING WITH THE FIRST LINE OF YOUR LETTER First Line: Here the weather remains the same. Constant Last Line: The sea repeats your name to the desireless sand LIGHT IS DUSKY THE SHADOWS LONG First Line: When people speak of recurring dreams, heart gets quiet Last Line: Once its special note has been pointed out, you hear all round LIKE A REVOLVING DOOR First Line: Heart feels sad. He's tired of being a heart Last Line: Sometimes a car stops. Sometimes there is nothing LIL' DARLIN' First Line: The radio station was a rip in the fabric Last Line: As behind him one by one the lights blink out LIVING ROOM First Line: Sunday, mid-afternoon, radiator pipes knocking Last Line: And her parents' thin shapes among heavily laden trees LOGO OF FIXED BEWILDERMENT First Line: In fragonard's painting of the girl on the swing Last Line: Hoping to take that day's interpretation of heart from you LONG STORY Poem Text First Line: There must have been a moment after the expulsion Last Line: And tack our few brave sentence onto the end Subject(s): Garden Of Eden LONG STORY First Line: There must have been a moment after the expulsion Last Line: And tack a few meager phrases onto the end Subject(s): Bodies LOST Poem Text First Line: A cry was heard among the trees LOUD MUSIC First Line: My stepdaughter and I circle round and round LOVE IS ELSEWHERE First Line: Heart journeys to a whorehouse to discuss love Last Line: Off key - no doubt a smart alecky remark in bird talk LOVE OF MUSIC Last Line: He had someplace important to get to, so he turned up his collar %and hurried away LULLABY; FOR STEPHEN KING First Line: The zero of a yawn eclipses your face Last Line: Goodnight, the century is going to sleep LUMBERJACK SHIRTS AND MOTORCYCLE BOOTS First Line: Lacking muscles that pop from beneath his shirt Last Line: He asks. No, no, declares heart, I'll eat them here MACFLECKNA'S STOREFRONT CHURCH First Line: Heart has grown enamored of a pear-shaped critic Last Line: Of a virgin's first night among the riffraff of sexual abandon MALDITOS MAKE A RACKET First Line: The banditos of memory gallop their sorry nags Last Line: And be like you or me or anyone-just a civilian MARCH MORNING First Line: It could never fly--the heart in its cage Last Line: Of muscle, while the heart heaves us upward, %with lips pursed to kiss the glistening air? Subject(s): Bodies MARSYAS, MIDAS AND THE BARBER First Line: The duel between marsyas and apollo was one of those Last Line: In favor of a long life and anonymity forever? MEN WITH LONG FACES First Line: The men with long faces have come after my knives Last Line: How shall the darkness now keep its distance? MERMAID First Line: When are we satisfied or get what we want Last Line: To his own unique but not uncommon story MIDDLE-AGED BLACK MEN First Line: Here is the sea and here a boat upon the sea Last Line: Here was the sea and here a boat upon the sea MINUTE GRIT IN DEATH'S UNDERGARMENTS First Line: Each fuck is a poke in death's meddlesome eye Last Line: His orb: death's own eye, of course, being forever dry MORE HE CONSIDERED HIS DEATH Last Line: Promise, it was the child who hurried forward to take him by the %hand MORGUE ATTENDANTS CLUTCH THEIR KEYS First Line: Heart checks out the morgue at midnight to catch Last Line: The living to work as day number xxx cranks up MORNING NEWS First Line: Searching for bugs, rolling in the grass Last Line: Their bright chatter as wisps of fog shift %like tattered cloth and soon the foghorns blow Subject(s): Bodies MORNING SONG First Line: Today, the pastures have dressed in their best grasses Last Line: Not knowing for what MOUNTAIN First Line: Who does the mountain belong to anyway? As wordsworth Last Line: That like a mountain he will ask nothing of all the world MUSIC ONE LOOKS BACK ON First Line: In early autumn, there's a concerto Last Line: And geese, geese flying south out of winter Subject(s): Bodies NAME-BURNING Poem Text First Line: Ashes, the dissonance of unicorns; the edges NAME-BURNING First Line: Ashes, the dissonance of unicorns: the edges Last Line: Shakes himself, grumbles off through fields %of flowering clover NATURE OF LOVE First Line: Heart makes an inquiry into the nature of love Last Line: To climb aboard. He holds his pen aloft like a baton NEW AUSTERITY First Line: Heart is lonely so he buys a bird Last Line: In the new austerity of heart's life, this is enough NIGHT SWIMMER First Line: Lifting his arms, the man half swims Last Line: When he had only his own good name to lose NIHILIST First Line: He was depressed so he made something Last Line: Wrong, wrong again. Listen carefully, hear the laughter NO HANDS First Line: Punch in the nose, kick in the head Last Line: Of the daffodils, then passes away NO MAP Poem Text First Line: How close the clouds press this october first Last Line: Showing the dark places and how to escape them? Subject(s): Surgery; Fathers & Sons; Birthdays NO MAP First Line: How close the clouds press this october first Last Line: Showing the dark places and how to escape them? Subject(s): Bodies NO MOMENT PAST THIS ONE Poem Text First Line: I tell you, it always seems to be out there NO MOMENT PAST THIS ONE First Line: I tell you, it seems to be always out there Last Line: How could I live, how could it be withstood? NO TANGOS TONIGHT First Line: Heart meets death in a fashionable singles bar Last Line: But then a dance begins, a tango. Heart will sit it out Subject(s): Dancing And Dancers; Death; Hearts NOISE THE HAIRLESS MAKE First Line: How difficult to be an angel. Last Line: The noise the hairless make when defeated NOSES First Line: Little emissary to tomorrow Last Line: Between these sweet upside down heart shapes? Subject(s): Bodies NOUNS OF ASSEMBLAGE First Line: Two scenes lie before us. In the first Last Line: Horde, clamor, litter, swarm) do you belong? OATMEAL DELUXE Poem Text First Line: This morning, because the snow swirled deep Subject(s): Oatmeal OATMEAL DELUXE First Line: This morning, because the snow swirled deep Last Line: What trouble could I make for you, a woman? OCCASIONALLY AND FOR WHAT SEEMED NO REASON Last Line: A few bright threads of borrowed splendor OCCUPANT IN PERMANENT TRANSIT First Line: Heart brings back a hermit crab from the beach Last Line: As big as alaska on its back. Bigger yet, the very planet ODYSSEUS'S HOMECOMING First Line: You see, it was the deception that did it OF COURSE HE SAW THAT HIS DISLIKE OF RECEIVED IDEAS Last Line: Mystification and obscurity, couldn't he claim that it was innovation? OFTEN IN DREAMS... Last Line: A dream city, all swept away when he departed from the other, %the one we call real OFTEN, IN DREAMS, HE MOVED THROUGH A CITY Last Line: The other, the one we call real OH, IMMOBILITY, DEATH'S VAST ASSOCIATE Poem Text First Line: Oh, immobility, death's vast associate, you are the still center around which we jog. Last Line: The reality? To bang your drum in the mortal parade. And the dream? To believe yourself dancing Subject(s): Alienation (social Psychology); Inertia OH, IMMOBILITY, DEATH'S VAST ASSOCIATE Last Line: Parade. And the dream? To believe yourself dancing Subject(s): Death; Dreams; Physical Disabilities OLD WHAT'S-HIS-NAME First Line: Heart writes a letter to the ones who are missing Last Line: Old what's-his-name, the fellow thinks: up to his tricks ONE GOOD TURNS DESERVES ANOTHER First Line: As a gift to his friends, heart offers to take on Last Line: He begins to recite every bit of verse he knows by heart ORPHEUS First Line: Immediately on emerging from the dark tunnel Last Line: But slaughter what had pricked their creature hearts? OVER A CUP OF COFFEE OR SITTING ON A PARK BENCH Poem Text Last Line: Uncharted lands. Subject(s): Childhood Memories OVER HERE HE MADE A PILE Last Line: Made its own pile OVER THERE HE MADE Poem Text First Line: Over there he made a pile of what he had had PABLO NERUDA First Line: Pablo neruda stands on a corner next to a poster Last Line: Throb deep in their black pockets. Bite me, bite me! PARACHUTES First Line: He'd not known he loved her so he let her go PARTY First Line: You enter a room -- indians, iraqis Last Line: That gets left over when all the rest collapses PASSING THE WORD Poem Text First Line: The poem as object; communicable; naked Subject(s): Poetry & Poets PASSING THE WORD First Line: The poem as object; communicable; naked Last Line: Her half smile nd dreams of trees heavy with apples PASTEL DRESSES First Line: Like a dream, which when one Last Line: Can we not hate it for what it takes away? PATIENCE Poem Text First Line: What is she ran shouting from the house? What if she Subject(s): Fathers & Daughters PENNY FOR YOUR THOUGHTS Poem Text First Line: This is how my friend behaves: first PENNY FOR YOUR THOUGHTS First Line: This is how my friend behaves: first Last Line: You take the vegetable and plant it PLACE BETWEEN US First Line: You sit as I do Last Line: With our own hands PLACE IN MAINE First Line: Shoebox upon shoebox -- the elderly dwawdle Last Line: And all my world is busting up outside PLAY IN FOUR ACTS Poem Text First Line: South was the promise we were born with PLEASURE OF CREATING SOMETHING Last Line: Foolish to think no payment was due; his error was in not learning %the price POEM ENDING WITH A LINE BY SU TUNG-PO First Line: My friend is afraid he is dying. Of course Last Line: One must make certain that the mind never clings PONY EXPRESS First Line: Some would have you think the pony express Last Line: Just seems to flash out as if someone had snatched %up its last light and smashed it to the ground? PRIVILEGES OF PHILOSOPHY First Line: Two barn owls discuss descartes as they Last Line: Shivers, yawns, then drops another two degrees PROOF First Line: The body's fear is to be forcibly overthrown Last Line: Pain corroborates the world. His body's %taste between his teeth proved he was alive Subject(s): Bodies PURSUIT Poem Text First Line: Each thing I do I rush through so I can do PUSHING AHEAD First Line: A brush fire that sweeps up the hill devouring Last Line: Of charred tree trunks? I made it, this is mine PUTTING IT ALL AWAY First Line: The wind from the mountains is closing my doors Last Line: The whole house is like red mittens. %I put them aside QUERENCIA First Line: In the children's story of ferdinand the bull Last Line: That word could have any meaning in such a world QUERENICA Poem Text First Line: In the children's story fernando the bull QUIET TIME First Line: Burdened by hazards the future seems to hold Last Line: The horses running loose over the bloody plain RAIN SONG First Line: The woods are full of men with umbrellas Last Line: Body greased and waiting for the long swim READY AND WAITING First Line: Heart feels ready to begin the work of forgiveness Last Line: What happens, nobody can say he was caught napping RECEIVERS OF THE WORLD'S ATTENTION First Line: It is the shoes that show the breaking point Last Line: A new black pump with the heel snapped off Subject(s): Bodies RED GERANIUMS Poem Text First Line: She says she believes in reincarnation Last Line: The sudden emotion the confusion then nothing? Subject(s): Flowers; Geraniums; Reincarnation; Transmigration; Pretas RED GERANIUMS First Line: She says she believes in reincarnation Last Line: Is this what causes these unexpected over-sweepings: %the sudden emotion, the confusion, then nothin Subject(s): Flowers; Geraniums; Reincarnation REFUSING THE NECESSARY First Line: Becoming the river, we are the river Last Line: And bottom, we may hang forever ROOM First Line: Either it's her sister or an apparition, and she hopes Last Line: Without book or roman senate or big sister to amuse her ROOTLESS Poem Text First Line: He must have been born with greased feet Last Line: Where he has come from and what lies ahead Subject(s): Bodies ROOTLESS First Line: He must have been born with greased feet Last Line: Where he has come from and what lies ahead Subject(s): Bodies ROUGHHOUSING Poem Text First Line: Tonight I let loose the weasel of my body Last Line: Your pastures rush toward me to embrace me Subject(s): Love - Erotic ROUGHHOUSING First Line: Tonight I let loose the weasel of my body Last Line: Your pastures rush toward me to embrace me Subject(s): Erotic Love SANTIAGO: FIVE MEN IN THE STREET: NUMBER ONE First Line: Four fellows in orange uniforms Last Line: Unfurl their little flags of green SANTIAGO: FIVE MEN IN THE STREET: NUMBER TWO First Line: In the back of a garbage truck parked on a side street Last Line: Into the trash with einstein and his furious sums! SANTIAGO: FORESTAL PARK First Line: Teenagers and oldsters, married couples and lovers -- Last Line: Kindly it takes my hand as we cross the busy street SANTIAGO: IN PRAISE OF COMMUNITY First Line: Six blind women bustle along with arms linked Last Line: Blinded by the excitement of completing his ode SANTIAGO: LA AVENIDA PEDRO DE VALDIVIA First Line: This is common: two ancient buses careening Last Line: Youngster flings into the face of another SANTIAGO: MARKET DAY IN WINTER First Line: Among market stalls the pickpockets prowl Last Line: Let me sit among thieves and learn to steal SAY THAT EACH WORD IS A BOARD Last Line: So slight that it might even be imagined. Breathe lightly, %don't you feel it now? SCATTERED OAKS IN FULL LEAF First Line: Why must calm and reasonable behavior make up Last Line: Morning light bedecking the palm trees, blue vaults ascending SEEING OFF A FRIEND First Line: Early april on broadway, south of union square Last Line: All his answers cover their faces SEPARATE TIME First Line: In the years since I saw you on sunday Last Line: And a woman calling her husband in for the night SEPARATIONS First Line: To begin with photographs of summer: lakes Last Line: Cold night, cold street: my love, we had such %kind intentions SHAVING First Line: It is really the most minuscule thing Last Line: Floating, and then they're gone of course Subject(s): Bodies SHORT RIDES First Line: What is the division between good intention Last Line: As life slips by in a succession of short rides SHRILL First Line: Like an abandoned car, engine gone Last Line: A writer, and her father, a rabbi--kind people %for whom her cry goes on undiminished Subject(s): Bodies SIDEBOARD'S MAHOGANY SURFACE First Line: Click, click, the man flicks out the downstairs' lights Last Line: The woman frowns, begins to speak, then bites her tongue SILENCE First Line: I am the music you were born to. Last Line: I am where you are going SIX POEMS ON MOVING First Line: I precede you in emergencies. I betray you Last Line: Now it is over you. Now it is falling SKELETON First Line: That human pyramid those circus Last Line: Cranks up and the lions, like a whiff of ruin, %dismember the complacency with their roars Subject(s): Bodies SKETCHING HECTOR'S EYE First Line: In my sketchbook of lonely moments Last Line: On my knees and weep as my own story ends SLIPPING AWAY First Line: It could be like one of those dreams Last Line: And across it is printed whose name? Subject(s): Bodies SLOTH First Line: If you were running, now you are Last Line: Close them. Tomorrow might be a hard day SO SKILLFUL GREW HIS RHETORIC OF SEDUCTION Last Line: More than particles of sand in a sahara of his making? SOMETIMES CONFUSION WAS A VEIL Poem Text First Line: Sometimes confusion was a veil across his eyes Last Line: Him at last in clarity as lately as he had seen them in confusion Subject(s): Confusion SOMETIMES CONFUSION WAS A VEIL ACROSS HIS EYES Last Line: Seeing him at last in clarity as lately he had seen them in %confusion SOMEWHERE IT STILL MOVES First Line: I was having dinner with my friends howie and francine Last Line: Is possible. We are the creatures that love and slaughter SONG FOR MAKING THE BIRDS COME Poem Text First Line: All winter you felt nothing. As your body SONG FOR MAKING THE BIRDS COME First Line: All winter you felt nothing. As your body Last Line: You have summoned arrive to make their nests SONG FOR PUTTING ASIDE ANGER Poem Text First Line: Four walls open to the sky. You are Subject(s): Anger SONG OF FOUR DANCERS First Line: A path between two rows of pines; spring Last Line: He cannot imagine a time without her SONG OF THE DROWNED BOY First Line: Three oranges on a blue plate Last Line: Lady of water has taken me home SONG OF THE WRONG RESPONSE First Line: The poem is bare-chested, black and Last Line: Each time you will act falsely and be afraid SORRY FRONDS OF THE PALM TREES First Line: Dressed in white and driving a white panel truck Last Line: As he patiently waits for the poison to exit his system SPIDER WEB Recitation by Author SPIDER WEB First Line: There are stories that unwind themselves as simply SPIRITUAL CHICKENS First Line: A man eats a chicken every day for lunch Last Line: His corner on truth? -- better just to go crazy SPITE First Line: I steal your mailbox, leave Last Line: Yesterday, I stole your curtains SPLEEN Poem Text First Line: Oh, much maligned one, meager hunkerer Last Line: The one, our burden, and the other, our dream Subject(s): Spleen (organ) SPLEEN First Line: Oh, much maligned one, meager hunkerer Last Line: The one, our burden, and the other, our dream Subject(s): Bodies SPRING RAIN First Line: Drill holes in small rocks, then press your lips Last Line: Turning back on themselves, always back on themselves STREET First Line: Across the street, the carpenter carries a golden Last Line: And all that immense black space between them STREETLIGHT First Line: The streetlight from my patents' bed at night split Last Line: You're nothing I desire -- then looks away SUCH DAYS AS THESE Poem Text SUCH DAYS AS THESE Last Line: Shadows across the lawn. How soon the sun begins to set SUCH PLEASURES HE HAD TAKEN Poem Text SUCH PLEASURES HE HAD TAKEN IN BOOKS Last Line: Measure himself against and nothing of the future to encourage his %restless speculation SUMMER EVENINGS Poem Text First Line: As I finish my wine, I think of my friends Last Line: Enriched by them Subject(s): Friendship SUMMER EVENINGS First Line: As I finish my wine, I think of my friends Last Line: The solitary journey made by each of us, %rushing streams, broad rivers, unknown seas Subject(s): Bodies SUN GAZERS Poem Text First Line: My stepdaughter is three and we have some games SUN GAZERS First Line: My stepdaughter is three and we have some games SURPRISE First Line: As a man with a trowel can smear wet concrete Last Line: And with what further disguises and gray %substitutions will the years malign my bones? Subject(s): Bodies SWEAT First Line: Lacrimae [or lachrymae] of the body, for whom do you weep? Last Line: Dark circles stain its clothes beneath the armpits Subject(s): Bodies; Perspiration SYRACUSE NIGHTS First Line: So your belly feels hungry Last Line: I guess your guess is as good as mine. %is that how the nights take you, my friend? TAKING A CRACK AT IT Poem Text First Line: We have discovered dark paint for the sky TEN FEET OF ROPE First Line: Tight around my waist the knot Last Line: This was a beginning TENDERLY Poem Text First Line: It's not a fancy restaurant, nor is it Last Line: Darling, touch me there, tenderly, one more time! Subject(s): Restaurants; Cafes; Diners TENDERLY First Line: It's not a fancy restaurant, nor is it Last Line: Darling, touch me there, tenderly, one more time Subject(s): Restaurants THAT DAY HE AND THE WOMAN SPENT HOURS ON HORSEBACK Last Line: Creatures, hauling themselves inch by inch toward ever vanishing %horizons? THAT STUFF ABOUT A BETTER PLACE First Line: It seems to heart that people are dying at a faster rate Last Line: And that, making diving misses as his friends go splat, splat THDE NEW AUSTERITY Poem Text First Line: Heart is lonely so he buys a bird Last Line: In the new austerity of heart's life, this is enough Subject(s): Pets THE BIRTH ANGELS Poem Text First Line: The heavy-lidded enterprise of the dead Last Line: A sudden consciousness, the thrashing of wings Subject(s): Angels THE BODY'S HOPE Poem Text First Line: Whatever lifts the body up -- muscles Last Line: But eagerness to plunge into the next second Subject(s): Bodies THE BODY'S JOURNEY Poem Text First Line: Born, it's not good for much, a vehicle Last Line: Its calming stroke and a loon warbles its cry? Subject(s): Bodies THE BODY'S JOY Poem Text First Line: The slick kiss of an oyster slipping Last Line: Flung thing caught in ther vanishing light Subject(s): Bodies THE CHERRY TREE Poem Text First Line: Perched on the fifth rung of the ladder, the girl Subject(s): Cherry Trees THE CLOUDS ABOVE THE OCEAN Poem Text First Line: The clouds above the ocean of mexico – how palable they are Last Line: With his surrender a minor event already lost from memory Subject(s): Clouds; Storms THE COMMUNITY Recitation by Author THE EXIGENCIES OF ART Recitation by Author THE GARDNER Poem Text Recitation by Author First Line: After the first astronauts reached heaven THE GREEDY CHILD Poem Text First Line: Gripping the mantle with thick fingers THE GUITAR LESSON Poem Text First Line: Hand gripping the girl's thigh, pressed nearly upon THE INVITATION Poem Text Recitation by Author First Line: There are lives in which nothing goes right THE MERCY OF LAZARUS Poem Text First Line: Groggy, sure, and in the midst of bad dreams Last Line: His miracle without your deceit-- your laugh and eager shout, the out-stretched arms? Subject(s): Lazarus THE MORE HE CONSIDERED HIS DEATH Poem Text Subject(s): Death; Dead, The THE MUSIC ONE LOOKS BACK ON Poem Text First Line: In early autumn, there's a concerto Last Line: And geese, geese flying flying south out of winter Subject(s): Guests; Family Life; Friendship THE PROOF Poem Text First Line: The body's fear is to be forcibly overthrown Last Line: Taste between his teeth proved he was alive Subject(s): Bodies THE ROOM Poem Text First Line: Either it's her sister or an apparition, and she hopes THE SIDEBOARD'S MAHOGANY SURFACE Poem Text First Line: Click, click, the man flicks out the downstairs' light THE STREET Poem Text First Line: Across the street, the carpenter carries a golden THE SURVIVAL VARIATION Poem Text First Line: Trees like apartment buildings, closed THE WAYS OF KEYS Poem Text First Line: The justice of bells, persistent in ringing THEIR TETE-A-TETE IS DONE First Line: Something deep, resembling headache or plantar wart Last Line: Tottering on the brink of the white space spilling past this point THESEUS WITHIN THE LABYRINTH Poem Text First Line: The lives of greeks in old days were deep THESEUS WITHIN THE LABYRINTH First Line: The lives of greeks in the old days were deep Last Line: Jumpy, full of second thoughts, and bravely unprepared THIS LIFE First Line: Blue sky to the south, clouds to the north Last Line: We will say is so impossible to walk through THOSE BRICK WALLS Last Line: Mark on the road to someplace else THOUGHTS AT THIRTY-THOUSAND FEET Poem Text First Line: The penny holds out its little promise Last Line: So keep the whole mess from exploding Subject(s): Air Travel THOUGHTS AT THIRTY-THOUSAND FEET First Line: The penny holds out its little promise Last Line: Like a locked door against the earth %to keep the whole mess from exploding Subject(s): Bodies THUS HE ENDURED First Line: Heart's friend greasy gets nixed by a stroke Last Line: His pals ditto: pallbearers envying the one who rides TO BLOW YOUR ENEMY A FINAL KISS First Line: Heart's two feet are stuck two feet deep in the muck Last Line: Return to litigate against the goat? Heart won't push his luck TO CONCEAL THE PIERCING LIGHT First Line: For a few weeks heart lugs about an antique possum Last Line: Heart puts a finger to his lips. Meanwhile his mind races TO EXIST IN THE GIVEN MINUTE First Line: A long stick with a hook and a first rate fly reel Last Line: All the negligible stuff he neglects, overlooks, or forgets he likes? TO KEEP ONE'S TREASURE PROTECTED Poem Text First Line: Within the lump of coal the flame lies hidden Last Line: A sigh – isn't it like a scream turned inward? Subject(s): Human Behavior TO PULL INTO ONESELF AS INTO A LOCKED ROOM First Line: These are days of sickness and forgetting Last Line: But to each one he says no TO SLEEP THE SLEEP OF THE JUST First Line: Heart is visited by the police who want him to discuss Last Line: Just the fear the old fossil might fall flat keeps him alert TO STAND ON A HIGH PLACE Poem Text TO STAND ON A HIGH PLACE Last Line: Line between shifting cloud and unsettled water TOMATOES Recitation by Author First Line: A woman tavels to brazil for plastic / surgery and a face-lift. She is sitxy Subject(s): Surgery, Plastic; Cosmetic Sugery; Face Lifts TOMATOES First Line: A woman tavels to brazil for plastic %surgery and a face-lift. She is sitxy Last Line: Starvation, think of his ravenous kisses Subject(s): Surgery, Plastic TONGUE First Line: Is it you who have destroyed me, sweetness Last Line: Still ascendent, embracing the compromise %that elevates death as the inevitable draw Subject(s): Bodies TOPLESS First Line: At first I went just for the girls Last Line: Zigzagged like lightning across the fretful dark TOTING IT UP Poem Text First Line: He bought one pair of boots, then another Last Line: In the distance, that brightly disappearing speck Subject(s): Conduct Of Life TOTING IT UP First Line: He bought one pair of boots, then another Last Line: In the distance, that brightly disappearing speck Subject(s): Bodies TRAFFIC First Line: I was driving to pick up my daughter from day care Last Line: And I would thrust my fingers into the grass %and hang there, arching my back and quick of breath Subject(s): Bodies; City Traffic TRIANGULAR FIELD First Line: In bright morning sunlight, the horse appears pink Last Line: But who for the brief moment he has chosen to believe TROUBLE IN MIND First Line: Blue shadows falling, heart explains to the cat Last Line: They shiver and drop gobs of oil. They rasp and growl UNDER THE GREEN CEILING First Line: Two men walk along the edge of a country road Last Line: Of a world that is endlessly random and violent UNEXPECTED HOLIDAY Poem Text First Line: In the story of orpheus and lot's wife Last Line: The slightest hint but still distinct taste of salt Subject(s): Lot (bible); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus; Sodom UNEXPECTED HOLIDAY First Line: In the story of orpheus and lot's wife Last Line: The slightest hint but still distinct taste of salt Subject(s): Lot (bible); Mythology - Classical; Orpheus; Sodom UNTIL WE DROOL AND PISS OURSELVES First Line: Car honk, donkey bray, seal bark - it's only since Last Line: This tumult, undefined, forms the footpath to the final death: his own Subject(s): Change; Death; Social Protest UPRISING First Line: Straitjacket, straitjacket, straitjacket Last Line: Let's make sure they bury us standing up UTOPIAN MELODIES First Line: As a stone has a sense of its hardness Subject(s): Bodies UTOPIAN MELODIES First Line: As a stone has a sense of its hardness Subject(s): Bodies VALENTINE MATHEMATICS First Line: Heart rides a wagon down a mountainside Last Line: A black line. Those who come next can add them up VANITY First Line: He lines the walls with mirrors Last Line: He wears fur coats inside out VELOCITY OF COWS First Line: Standing there with tony sorce Last Line: Share the velocity of cows VISITOR Poem Text First Line: Those patches of cold air on the far side Last Line: Now the chance of answering has passed? Subject(s): Death; Souls WAKING First Line: Waking, I look at you sleeping beside me Last Line: Seemed clear and each moment was its own reward WAKING, THE CHEERING BEGINS Poem Text First Line: Suddenly, rising, another rises with him WALLS TO PUT UP, WALLS TO TAKE DOWN First Line: The old madhouse in santiago stood tucked back Last Line: Leaving just the city, its constant jittery motion Subject(s): Bodies WAY IT GOES OR THE PROPER USE OF LEISURE TIME First Line: Now all my words are bricks Last Line: This is a poem abut being alone WAYS OF KEYS First Line: The justice of bells persistent in ringing Last Line: Learn the ways of keys WHAT GOOD IS LOVE UNLESS IT'S AGGRESSIVE? First Line: Deck the halls with cock and balls, intones heart Last Line: Before the greasy water in his fish tank breaks into a boil WHAT NEXT? First Line: Heart tunes in his poetry shortwave crystal set Last Line: But this time no waiting on the front steps staring at his mailbox WHAT THEY DO ALWAYS First Line: Through the peugeot's open window we heard it Last Line: Here a splash makes no sound. It must be imagined WHAT YOU HAVE COME TO EXPECT First Line: The worn plush of the seat chafes your bare legs Last Line: Is the crude outline of the moon's: distant, as any family %you might have had; cold, in a way you h WHAT YOU SHOULD HAVE THOUGHT ABOUT EARLIER First Line: Twelve murderers are eating their dinners Last Line: The ones you should have thought about earlier. %ring ding goes the doorbell. Welcome to crazy times Subject(s): Bodies WHEN HE FELT MOST LOVED Last Line: Or had ever known more than the rock walls and shadow WHEN HE WAS MAKING LOVE Last Line: Claim him, none of his own WHEN THE LEAVES FELL AND THE OCTOBER WIND SHOOK THE TREES Last Line: Wind through the trees he felt certain he heard his name being %called WHEN TUBES PIERCE EVERY EXTREMITY First Line: Wrinkled face and liver-spotted hands Last Line: And out creeps the old joy-hook for a fortifying pinch WHEN YOU'RE DANCING, MAKE THE WHOLE WORLD DANCE WITH YOU Poem Text First Line: Bring my name upon a platter, I have danced Subject(s): Dancing & Dancers WHERE WE ARE First Line: A man tears a chunk of bread off the brown loaf Last Line: From the dark, flits across a lighted hall and disappears WHITE PIG First Line: A family decides to have a party Last Line: Through the dark places, songs of conquest and revenge WHITE SKIRT First Line: For an hour he wonders what the girl could be thinking Last Line: Grips his arm, draws him down to his own dark home WHITE THIGHS First Line: White thighs like slices of white cake Last Line: His final capitulation to the dark WHO IS MISTAKEN? First Line: These small lizards darting across the white Last Line: Brute nature. Some he plays with, some he eats WHY FOOL AROUND? Poem Text First Line: How smart is smart? Thinks heart. Is smart Last Line: Smart or stupid they circle the hook: their education Subject(s): Reason; Schools; Intellect; Rationalism; Brain; Mind; Intellectuals; Students WHY FOOL AROUND? First Line: How smart is smart? Thinks heart. Is smart Last Line: Smart or stupid they circle the hook: their education Subject(s): Reason; Schools WHY IS HE SUDDENLY PARALYZED? First Line: Sometimes the sky is so blue that it makes heart sad Last Line: Accustomed to the importunities of dreamers such as heart WIND CHIMES First Line: Begin with a victorian cottage in a rhode island Last Line: At the door and his whole busy life rushes forward WINDOW First Line: The woman who is waiting for the evening draws Last Line: Look, they say, see how gracefully we are dancing WINTER NIGHTS First Line: Like day laborers bunched around a construction site Last Line: And ever so fragile expectation of happiness? WISH HAD BEEN THERE ALL ALONG Last Line: Watch the clouds in their flight across the sky WORLD'S MASTER PLAN First Line: Baby bird with uplifted beak. Kitten, calf, or pup Last Line: Defecation constructs the globe on which he stands WORLD'S SIDEWALKS AND DAILY HOOPLA First Line: When heart's lover's breast gets lopped off - a surgeon's Last Line: Slope, the arched expanse of velvet skin, the perky nipple WOUNDS WITHOUT PAIN First Line: For heart this earth is neither spherical nor flat Last Line: Only rocks stay put, he thinks, folks like us live on the fly YELLOW BEAK Poem Text First Line: A man owns a green parrot with a yellow beak Subject(s): Life; Parrots YOU TAKE A TRAIN THROUGH A FOREIGN COUNTRY Last Line: You can almost hear the door again bang shut, the key grate in the %lock |
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