Memory

We present this work in honor of the 55th anniversary of the poet’s death.

Late, late last night, when the whole world slept,
Along to the garden of dreams I crept.
And I pulled the bell of an old, old house
Where the moon dipped down like a little white mouse.
I tapped the door and I tossed my head:
“Are you in, little girl? Are you in?” I said.
And while I waited and shook with cold
Through the door tripped me—just eight years old.
I looked so sweet with my pigtails down,
Tied up with a ribbon of dusky brown,
With a dimpled chin full of childish charme,
And my old black dolly asleep in my arms.
I sat me down when I saw myself,
And I told little tales of a moonland elf.
I laughed and sang as I used to do
When the world was ruled by Little Boy Blue.
Then I danced with a toss and a twirl
And said: “Now have you been a good, good girl?
Have you had much spanking since you were Me?
And does it feel fine to be twenty-three?”
I kissed me then, and I said farewell,
For I’ve earned more spanks than I dared to tell,
And Eight must never see Twenty-three
As she peeps through the door of Memory.

Abundant Hope

On Martin Luther King Day, we present this work that was written in his honor.

Reverend Martin Luther King

The great soul
Flew from the Creator
Bearing manna of hope
For his country
Starving severely from an absence
of compassion.

Martin Luther King

The Great Spirit,
Came from the Creator
Proffering a sparkling fountain of fair play
To his country
Parched and deformed by hate.
The whole man came forth
With a brain of gentle wisdom
To persuade quiet
Upon the loud misery of the mob.
A whole man stood out
With a mellifluous voice
To bind the joints of cruelty.
A whole man came
In the midst of a murderous nightmare
Surrounded by demons of war
He dared to dream peace and serenity
With a heart of faith
He hoped
To resurrect his nation.
I open my mouth to the Lord,
And I won’t turn back.

Martin Luther King

Faced the racial
Mountain of segregation and
And bade it move.
The giant mound of human ignorance
Centuries old
And rigid in its determination
Did move, however slightly,
however infinitesimally,
It did move.
I will go, I shall go
I’ll see what the end will be.

Martin Luther King

Brought winds of healing
To his country
Reeling unsteady
With the illness
Of racial prejudice,
Screams of vulgarity
Could not silence him.
Fire bombs and dogs
Could not take his voice away
Ona my knees,
I told God how you treated me
Ona my knees.
He knew himself
A child of God
On a mission from God, and
Standing in the hand of God.
He spoke to the hideous hearts
And to the bitter monstrosities
And asked them to transform
Their ways and thereby
Liberate his country.
Representing the grace of heaven
He spoke to the evils of Hell
Representing gentleness
He sang to brutes.
He brought the great songs of faith
Persuading men and women
To think beyond
Their baser nature.
Lord, don’t move your mountain,
Just give me strength to climb it.
He hummed the old gospels
Encouraging the folk to act
Beyond their puny selves.
You don’t have to move
That stumbling block,
Lord, just lead me around it.
Leader to those who would be led
And hero to millions.

Martin Luther King

Was father to
Yolanda,
Martin, III,
Dexter, and,
Bernice.
He was lover
Friend, and
Husband
To
Coretta Scott King.
He spoke respectfully
Of the Torah.
He spoke respectfully
Of the Koran.
In India, walked in the footprints
Of Mohandas Mahatma Gandhi.
Christianity made him patient
With all religions
And his tremendous heart
Made him believe
That all people
Were his people
All creeds and cultures
Were comfortable in
His giant embrace
And all just causes
Were his to support and extol
Through sermons and allocutions
With praise songs and orations
He preached fair play and serenity
From hand cuffs and prison garb
From leg irons and prison bars
He taught triumph over loss
And love over despair
Hallelujah over the dirges and
Joy over moaning.
Fear not, we’ve come too far to turn back
We are not afraid, and
We shall overcome
We shall overcome
Deep in my heart
I do believe
We shall overcome
Someday.

fragments

While little of the poet’s work survives, and very little context is known, we have made an effort to piece these fragments together in a manner that may be interpreted as cohesive if the reader chooses.

Pain penetrates

Me drop
by drop

You may forget but

Let me tell you
this: someone in
some future time
will think of us

Before they were mothers

Leto and Niobe
had been the most
devoted of friends

If you are squeamish

Don’t prod the
beach rubble

Experience shows us

Wealth unchaperoned
by Virtue is never
an innocuous neighbor

We know this much

Death is an evil;
we have the gods’
word for it; they too
would die if death
were a good thing

Lachin Y Gair

George Gordon, Lord Byron
Scots
1788 – 1824

Away, ye gay landscapes, ye garden of roses!
In you let the minions of luxury rove;
Restore me to the rocks, where the snowflake reposes,
Though still they are sacred to freedom and love:
Yet, Caledonia, beloved are thy mountains,
Round their white summits though elements war;
Though cataracts foam ‘stead of smooth-flowing fountains,
I sigh for the valley of dark Loch na Garr.
Ah! there my young footsteps in infancy wandered;
My cap was teh bonnet, my cloak was the plaid;
On chieftains long perished my memory pondered,
As daily I strode through the pine-covered glade;
I sought not my home till the day’s dying glory
Gave place to the rays of the bright polar star;
For fancy was cheered by traditional story,
Disclosed by the natives of dark Loch na Garr.

“Shades of the dead! have I not heard your voices
Rise on the night-rolling breath of the gale?”
Surely the soul of the hero rejoices,
And rides on the wind, o’er his own Highland vale.
Rouch Loch na Garr while the stormy mist gathers,
Winter presides in his cold icy car:
Clouds there encircle the forms of my fathers;
They dwell in the tempests of dark Loch na Garr.

“Ill-starred, though brave, did no visions foreboding
Tell you that fate had forsaken your cause?”
Ah! were you destined to die at Culloden,
Victory crowned not your fall with applause:
Still were you happy in death’s earthy slumber,
You rest with your clan in the caves of Braemar;
The pibroch resounds, to the piper’s loud number,
Your deeds on the echoes of dark Loch na Garr.

Years have rolled on, Loch na Garr, since I left you,
Years must elapse ere I tread you again:
Nature of verdure and flowers has bereft you,
Yet still are you dearer than Albion’s plain.
England! thy beauties are tame and domestic
To one who has roved o’er the mountains afar:
Oh for the crags that are wild and majestic!
The steep frowning glories of the dark Loch na Garr.

Children

Long-summer scorched, my surfing children
Catch random waves or thump in dumpers,
Whirling, gasping, tossed disjointed.
I watching, fear they may be broken –
That all those foaming limbs will never
Re-assemble whole, together.
All under such a peaceful sky.
All under such another sky

The pictures show some village children
Caught at random, tossed, exploded,
Torn, disjointed, like sticks broken,
Whose jagged scorching limbs will never
Re-assemble whole together.

Why an Introduction Dear

In honor of Uzhavar Thirunal, we present this work by one of India’s greatest 20th century poets.

Why an introduction dear, you are within me,
reflections on starry nights, memories of a life,
creations of life in short spells, eyes notice
creations of life in short spells, eyes notice
gentle footsteps!
I don’t much to treasure anymore,
you are the treasure I have in me.

Your dazzling, radiant smile like sunrise
Is the reflection of fragrant sorrow,
it is consciousness, and dreamy slumber,
Let me tire and sleep incessantly, for
Would I understand the creation, big-bang!!

You are drawn, I am just an outline,
you are the sweet melody, I am just a string of notes,
you are limitless, I am but an illusion of limits,
In the secrecy of real image-reflection,
why enact to be lovers!!!

Why an introduction, since you are within me.

It’s True I Went to Market

In honor of Thiruvalluvar, we present this work by one of history’s greatest Hindu mystic poets.

My friend, I went to the market and bought the Dark One.
You claim by night, I claim by day.
Actually I was beating a drum all the time I was buying him.
You say I gave too much; I say too little.
Actually, I put him on a scale before I bought him.
What I paid was my social body, my town body, my family body, and all my inherited jewels.
Mirabai says: The Dark One is my husband now.
Be with me when I lie down; you promised me this in an earlier life.

Where the Mind is Without Fear

In Honor of Makar Sankranti, we present this work by India’s greatest poet.

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

Heartaches of the Lagoon

My early unforgettable years I lived them
Close to the sea,
There by the shallow and calm sea,
There by the open and boundless sea.

And every time that my budding, early life
Comes back to me,
And I see the dreams and hear the voices
Of my early life there by the sea,

You, oh my heart, feel the same old yearning:
If I could live again,
Close to the shallow and calm sea,
There by the open and boundless sea.

Was it really my destiny, was it my fortune,
I haven’t met another
A sea within me as shallow as a lake,
And like an ocean boundless and big.

And, lo! In my sleep a dream brought her
Close again to me,
The same there shallow and calm sea,
The same there boundless and open sea.

Yet, thrice be alas! A grief was poisoning me,
A powerful grief,
A grief that you did not lighten, my dream
Of my great early love, my home by the sea.

What storm, I wonder, was raging in me,
And what whirlwind,
That couldn’t put it to rest, or lull it to sleep
My wonderful dream of my home by the sea.

A grief that is unspoken, an unexplained grief,
A powerful grief,
A grief not quenched even within the paradise
Of our early life close to the boundless sea.

Erotic Sonnet V

We present this work in honor of the 45th anniversary of the poet’s death.

My life goes on as usual, why dear friend would you ask:
awake and a horror, I head for the bath
and with Helena Rubinstein lotions and creams
staunch the wrinkles, mend the seams.

I go to work. But is it work?
the monthly bulletin, year after year…
then lunch with the oddball
Minister fate has assigned me here.

Sometimes I give my usual class;
sleepily arrive at my office;
there, I’ve completed my official tasks.

Now it’s home sweet home and fare you well;
my guts are bored
by my usual clientele.

Poets Corner

Celebrating a world of written and spoken verse

Memory

Abundant Hope

fragments

Lachin Y Gair

Children

Why an Introduction Dear

It’s True I Went to Market

Where the Mind is Without Fear

Heartaches of the Lagoon

Erotic Sonnet V