We present this work in honor of the Moroccan holiday, Enthronement.
Poetry will be your dress
when you yield your soul
back to its maker
You’ll strike down your enemies
through mortal silence
and the language assassinated
under your fingers
With it you’ll tattoo
the snout of the good-for-nothings
and you’ll bring down the sphinx a peg or two
We present this work in honor of the poet’s 145th birthday.
i met a toad
the other day by the name
of warty bliggens
he was sitting under
a toadstool
feeling contented
he explained that when the cosmos
was created
that toadstool was especially
planned for his personal
shelter from sun and rain
thought out and prepared
for him
do not tell me
said warty bliggens
that there is not a purpose
in the universe
the thought is blasphemy
a little more
conversation revealed
that warty bliggens
considers himself to be
the center of the same
universe
the earth exists
to grow toadstools for him
to sit under
the sun to give him light
by day and the moon
and wheeling constellations
to make beautiful
the night for the sake of
warty bliggens
to what act of yours
do you impute
this interest on the part
of the creator
of the universe
i asked him
why is it that you
are so greatly favored
ask rather
said warty bliggens
what the universe
has done to deserve me
if i were a
human being i would
not laugh
too complacently
at poor warty bliggens
for similar
absurdities
have only too often
lodged in the crinkles
of the human cerebrum
archy
Surely she does not lack beauty
Nor skills in sewing and weaving.
But she grew up in a poor family
So good matchmakers ignore her.
She never looks cold or hungry,
All day long she weaves by her window.
Only her parents feel sorry for her;
Neighbors would never know of it.
A pair of golden scissors in her hand,
Fingers stiffened by the night’s chill.
She cuts a bridal costume for another,
Yet year after year she sleeps alone.
We present this work in honor of the poet’s 125th birthday.
It’s not air that I breathe,
that is ice freezing
the blood of my senses.
The ground I tread opens for me.
Wherever I look darkens.
My eyes open, weeping
already when the day dawns.
And before dawn,
they look at the world
and do not want to believe…
Man runs towards the grave,
And rivers hasten to the great deep
The end of all living is their death,
And the palace in time becomes a heap.
Nothing is further than the day gone by,
And nothing nearer than the day to come,
And both are far, far away
From the man hidden in the heart of the tomb.
We present this work in honor of the Tunisian holiday, Republic Day.
The revolution that burst out the rose of wind in the sand,
And for which Anemone bled in the field
Is now led by grave wisdom
Filling our lungs with incense’s rotten fume …
Birds are alarmed by the hissing of the leaves
The mole broadens the strategy of the pit,
And announces today the birth of his (nightly) ninety-ninth party
While, from a thousand sheds, echoes Surat The Merciful.
Fluttering, the orioles
male and female together, so.
Reminded of my loneliness;
with whom will I ever go?
We present this work in honor of the Egyptian holiday, Revolution Day.
I’m a poet
I’m still painting from bleeding wounds
A new song
I’m still building in the prisons of oppression
Happy times
I’m still writing
Even though the letter kills me
And throws me in front of people
like stray melodies
Or whenever appears before the eyes
A stubborn wish
A stray arrow glides into the night
And brings it down… a martyr
We present this work in honor of the poet’s 125th birthday.
My mind’s a map. A mad sea-captain drew it
Under a flowing moon until he knew it;
Winds with brass trumpets, puffy-cheeked as jugs,
And states bright-patterned like Arabian rugs.
“Here there be tygers.” “Here we buried Jim.”
Here is the strait where eyeless fishes swim
About their buried idol, drowned so cold
He weeps away his eyes in salt and gold.
A country like the dark side of the moon,
A cider-apple country, harsh and boon,
A country savage as a chestnut-rind,
A land of hungry sorcerers.
Your mind?
—Your mind is water through an April night,
A cherry-branch, plume-feathery with its white,
A lavender as fragrant as your words,
A room where Peace and Honor talk like birds,
Sewing bright coins upon the tragic cloth
Of heavy Fate, and Mockery, like a moth,
Flutters and beats about those lovely things.
You are the soul, enchanted with its wings,
The single voice that raises up the dead
To shake the pride of angels.
I have said.
We present this work in honor of the 95th anniversary of the poet’s death.
Such peace holds sway here!
One would say the graves themselves were smiling,
while the dead converse in muted tones
in upper case, deep in the darkness.
From there with plain and simple words
they want to reach our peaceful hearts.
But their lament, whatever they desire to say,
fails in its purpose, for they’ve fled too far away.
All that’s here to mark Martzokis are two
sticks of wood laid one across the other.
For Vasiliadis, here’s a great stone book.
And a plaque half hidden in the grass
– for that’s how Death presents her now –
this is Lamari, a forgotten poet.
Poets Corner 