Poems that I love

by William Shakespeare The expense of spirit in a waste of shame Is lust in action; and till action, lust Is perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame, Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust, Enjoy'd no sooner but despised straight, Past reason hunted, and no sooner had Past reason hated, as a swallow'd bait On purpose laid to make the taker mad; Mad in pursuit and in possession so; Had, having, and in quest to have, extreme; A bliss in proof, and proved, a very woe; Before, a joy proposed; behind, a dream. All this the world well knows; yet none knows well To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.

by Philip Whalen I praise those ancient Chinamen Who left me a few words, Usually a pointless joke or a silly question A line of poetry drunkenly scrawled on the margin of a quick Splashed picture ­– bug, leaf, Caricature of Teacher on paper held together now by little more than ink & their own strength brushed momentarily over it Their world & several others since Gone to hell in a handbasket, they knew it – Cheered as it whizzed by – & conked out among the busted spring rain cherryblossom winejars Happy to have saved us all.

by Donald Hall If he and she do not know each other, and feel confident they will not meet again; if he avoids affectionate words; if she has grown insensible skin under skin; if they desire only the tribute of another's cry; if they employ each other as revenge on old lovers or families of entitlement and steel— then there will be no betrayals, no letters returned unread, no frenzy, no hurled words of permanent humiliation, no trembling days, no vomit at midnight, no repeated apparition of a body floating face-down at the pond's edge

by Allen Ginsberg Everybody loves the first glimpse of naked love Everybody’s story is the most thrilling in the world Everybody tells their best friend their tale of the raw behind First time they discovered an open heart with their pants down

by Ikkyu A master's handiwork cannot be measured But still priests wag their tongues explaining the "Way" and babbling about "Zen." This old monk has never cared for false piety And my nose wrinkles at the dark smell of incense before the Buddha.

by Timothy Liu The earth has moved forward, in a sense, or does it merely turn against itself? The trees have moved forward, putting forth leaves, shade. But I have not moved forward though I was surely moved. At the St. Regis Hotel , the butlers change fresh roses that need no changing, butlers who are paid to notice the most infinitesimal, the almost unseen, the earth turning towards its own demise, too far off to be seen, myself all along hoping for a longer winter to burrow in for just a few more months instead of turning forty here in this world that you have left me but the weather asks us to emerge, face the present conditions we'd never have imagined, not to the dream of love returned but of love withheld and its unsettling tensions as the earth turns, no matter where we turn, the tension in the simultaneous seasons moving across the face of the earth, in all the leaves that will lose their shimmer, given time, while I wait inside the unseen decay of a hotel...

by Bill Holm for Bonnie Johnson Above me, wind does its best to blow leaves off the aspen tree a month too soon. No use wind. All you succeed In doing is making music, the noise of failure growing beautiful.                            

Julia Wilson Carroll a poem for my aunt by Ken Ireland I sit by the phone and wait for word that she has died, ready to cry. But the news is still the same: she is resting comfortably. If she has lucid moment, yes, I will tell her that her nephew from California loves her. When we last spoke I was 10. If that is how she remembers me, I will not complain or correct. She only complains that the fall had blurred her eyes. She could no longer call the pitch strike or ball. Keep you eye on the ball, you are the best aunt in the world. My last words. It was just a spill that an ordinary person could have walked off, but it shattered her back and pelvis. Unable to speak, she pointed to the legal paper she had prepared. The priest was called. He forgave, prayed and left. An intern hauled out the tubes while my father stood expecting her last breath. 15 days later, nurses and doctors admire the body’s desire to surviv...

by John Donne S TAND still, and I will read to thee A lecture, Love, in Love's philosophy. These three hours that we have spent, Walking here, two shadows went Along with us, which we ourselves produced. But, now the sun is just above our head, We do those shadows tread, And to brave clearness all things are reduced. So whilst our infant loves did grow, Disguises did, and shadows, flow From us and our cares ; but now 'tis not so. That love hath not attain'd the highest degree, Which is still diligent lest others see. Except our loves at this noon stay, We shall new shadows make the other way. As the first were made to blind Others, these which come behind Will work upon ourselves, and blind our eyes. If our loves faint, and westerwardly decline, To me thou, falsely, thine And I to thee mine actions shall disguise. The morning shadows wear away, But these grow longer all the day ; But O ! love's day is short, if love decay. Love is a growing, or full constant ligh...

by Donald Hall When you fall in love you jockey the horse into the flaming barn. You hire a cabin on the shiny Titanic. You tease the black bear. Reading the Monitor you scan the obituaries looking for your name.

by Walt Whitman (Excerpt from the 1855 edition) Trippers and askers surround me, People I meet….the effect upon me of my early life….of the ward and city I live in….of the nation, The latest news….discoveries, inventions, societies….authors old and new, My dinner, dress, associates, looks, business, compliments, dues, The real or fancied indifference of some man or woman I love, The sickness of one of my folks­-or of myself….or ill-doing….or loss or lack of money….or depressions or exaltations, These come to me days and nights and go from me again, But they are not the Me myself. Apart from the pulling and hauling stands what I am, Stands amused, complacent, compassionating, idle, unitary, Looks down, is erect, bends an arm on an impalpable certain rest, Looks with its sidecurved head, curious what will come next, Both in and out of the game, and watching and wondering want wondering at it. …………………………………………………………………………. I believe in you my s...

by Jack Gilbert How astonishing it is that language can almost mean, and frightening that it does not quite. Love, we say, God, we say, Rome and Michiko, we write, and the words get it all wrong. We say bread and it means according to which nation. French has no word for home, and we have no word for strict pleasure. A people in northern India is dying out because their ancient tongue has no words for endearment. I dream of lost vocabularies that might express some of what we no longer can. Maybe the Etruscan texts would finally explain why the couples on their tombs are smiling. And maybe not. When the thousands of mysterious Sumerian tablets were translated, they seemed to be business records. But what if they are poems or psalms? My joy is the same as twelve Ethiopian goats standing silent in the morning light. O Lord, thou art slabs of salt and ingots of copper, as grand as ripe barley lithe under the wind's labor. Her breasts are six white oxen loaded with bolts of lon...

657 I dwell in Possibility— A fairer House than Prose— More numerous of Windows— Superior—for Doors— Of Chambers as the Cedars— Impregnable of Eye— And for an Everlasting Roof The Gambrels of the Sky— Of Visitors—the fairest— For Occupation—This— The spreading wide of narrow Hands To gather Paradise—

by Mary Oliver As I was searching for poems for a memorial service, I looked through some poems by Mary Oliver, a woman I usually take to be a Buddhist poet though I have no evidence other than the way her words land in my heart, and found this gem which I want to share. Sweet Jesus, talking his melancholy madness, stood up in the boat and the sea lay down, silky and sorry. So everybody was saved that night. But you know how it is when something different crosses the threshold—the uncles mutter together, the women walk away, the young brother begins to sharpen his knife. Nobody knows what the soul is. It comes and goes like the wind over the water— sometimes, for days, you don’t think of it. Maybe after the sermon, after the multitude was fed, one or two of them felt the soul slip forth like a tremor of pure sunlight, before exhaustion, that wants to swallow everything, gripped their bones and left them miserable and sleepy, as they are now, for...