"Light is sufficient to itself."

Emily Dickinson (via inthelowlight)

@5 days ago with 47 notes
#quoted #poetry #yep.

Riprap

― Gary Snyder

Lay down these words
Before your mind like rocks.
placed solid, by hands
In choice of place, set
Before the body of the mind
in space and time:
Solidity of bark, leaf, or wall
riprap of things:
Cobble of milky way.
straying planets,
These poems, people,
lost ponies with
Dragging saddles —
and rocky sure-foot trails.
The worlds like an endless
four-dimensional
Game of Go.
ants and pebbles
In the thin loam, each rock a word
a creek-washed stone
Granite: ingrained
with torment of fire and weight
Crystal and sediment linked hot
all change, in thoughts,
As well as things.

@1 week ago with 5 notes
#poetry

"
Your word
travels
the entirety of
space
and reaches
my cells
which are
my stars
then goes to
yours
which are
my light.

Ghosts.
"

Frida Kahlo, from The Diary Of Frida Kahlo: An Intimate Self-Portrait (via violentwavesofemotion)

@2 weeks ago with 276 notes
#poetry

artemisdreaming:

.

Verb

I’m going to wrinkle this word,
I’m going to twist it,
yes,
it is much too flat
it is as if a great dog or great river
had passed its tongue or water over it
during many years.

I want that in the word
the roughness is seen
the iron salt
The de-fanged strength
of the land,
the blood
of those who have spoken and those who have not spoken.

I want to see the thirst
Inside the syllables
I want to touch the fire
in the sound:
I want to feel the darkness
of the cry. I want
words as rough
as virgin rocks.

Pablo Neruda
Translation: T. Lauth - Image: David Levine via: jalberts.net

@3 weeks ago with 23 notes
#YES. #poetry

The More Loving One

by W.H. Auden

Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.

How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.

Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.

Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.

@4 weeks ago with 2 notes
#poetry #love #my stream of consciousness

"But often in the world’s most crowded streets,
But often, in the din of strife,
There rises an unspeakable desire
After the knowledge of our buried life,
A thirst to spend our fire and restless force
In tracking out our true, original course;
A longing to enquire
Into the mystery of this heart that beats
So wild, so deep in us, to know
Whence our thoughts come and where they go.
[…]
But hardly have we, for one little hour,
Been on our own line, have we been ourselves;
Hardly had skill to utter one of all
The nameless feelings that course through our breast,
But they course on for ever unexpress’d.
And long we try in vain to speak and act
Our hidden self, and what we say and do
Is eloquent, is well — but ‘tis not true:
And then we will no more be rack’d
With inward striving, and demand
of all the thousand nothings of the hour
Their stupefying power;
Ah yes, and they benumb us at our call:
Yet still, from time to time, vague and forlorn,
From the soul’s subterranean depth upborne
As from an infinitely distant land,
Come airs, and floating echoes, and convey
A melancholy into all our day."

Matthew Arnold, “The Buried Life”

@1 week ago
#poetry #current read

by Frank O’Hara

—

I think you’re wonderful and so does everyone else.

Just as Jackie Kennedy has a baby boy, so will you—even bigger.

You will meet a tall beautiful blonde stranger, and you will not say hello.

You will take a long trip and you will be very happy, though alone.

You will marry the first person who tells you your eyes are like scrambled eggs.

In the beginning there was YOU—there will always be YOU, I guess.

You will write a great play and it will run for three performances.

Please phone The Village Voice immediately: they want to interview you.

Roger L. Stevens and Kermit Bloomgarden have their eyes on you.

Relax a little; one of your most celebrated nervous tics will be your undoing.

Your first volume of poetry will be published as soon as you finish it.

You may be a hit uptown, but downtown you’re legendary!

Your walk has a musical quality which will bring you fame and fortune.

You will eat cake.

Who do you think you are, anyway? Jo Van Fleet?

You think your life is like Pirandello, but it’s really like O’Neill.

A few dance lessons with James Waring and who knows? Maybe something will happen.

That’s not a run in your stocking, it’s a hand on your leg.

I realize you’ve lived in France, but that doesn’t mean you know EVERYTHING!

You should wear white more often—it becomes you.

The next person to speak to you will have a very intriquing proposal to make.

A lot of people in this room wish they were you.

Have you been to Mike Goldberg’s show? Al Leslie’s? Lee Krasner’s?

At times, your disinterestedness may seem insincere, to strangers.

Now that the election’s over, what are you going to do with yourself?

You are a prisoner in a croissant factory and you love it.

You eat meat. Why do you eat meat?

Beyond the horizon there is a vale of gloom.

You too could be Premier of France, if only … if only…

@1 week ago
#poetry

awriiter:

Letterpress Poem by e.e. cummings

(via teachingliteracy)

@3 weeks ago with 380 notes
#this is awesome #poetry

"For what wears out the life of mortal men?
‘Tis that from change to change their being rolls:
‘Tis that repeated shocks, again, again,
Exhaust the energy of strongest souls,
And numb the elastic powers.
Till having us’d our nerves with bliss and teen,
And tir’d upon a thousand schemes our wit,
To the just-pausing Genius we remit
Our worn-out life, and are — what we have been."

Matthew Arnold, “The Scholar Gipsy”

@3 weeks ago with 1 note
#poetry #current read #My sentiments exactly.

@1 month ago with 1 note
#poetry

"Light is sufficient to itself."

Emily Dickinson (via inthelowlight)

(via journalofanobody)

5 days ago
#quoted #poetry #yep.

"But often in the world’s most crowded streets,
But often, in the din of strife,
There rises an unspeakable desire
After the knowledge of our buried life,
A thirst to spend our fire and restless force
In tracking out our true, original course;
A longing to enquire
Into the mystery of this heart that beats
So wild, so deep in us, to know
Whence our thoughts come and where they go.
[…]
But hardly have we, for one little hour,
Been on our own line, have we been ourselves;
Hardly had skill to utter one of all
The nameless feelings that course through our breast,
But they course on for ever unexpress’d.
And long we try in vain to speak and act
Our hidden self, and what we say and do
Is eloquent, is well — but ‘tis not true:
And then we will no more be rack’d
With inward striving, and demand
of all the thousand nothings of the hour
Their stupefying power;
Ah yes, and they benumb us at our call:
Yet still, from time to time, vague and forlorn,
From the soul’s subterranean depth upborne
As from an infinitely distant land,
Come airs, and floating echoes, and convey
A melancholy into all our day."

Matthew Arnold, “The Buried Life”

1 week ago
#poetry #current read

Riprap

esferacontemplada:

― Gary Snyder

Lay down these words
Before your mind like rocks.
placed solid, by hands
In choice of place, set
Before the body of the mind
in space and time:
Solidity of bark, leaf, or wall
riprap of things:
Cobble of milky way.
straying planets,
These poems, people,
lost ponies with
Dragging saddles —
and rocky sure-foot trails.
The worlds like an endless
four-dimensional
Game of Go.
ants and pebbles
In the thin loam, each rock a word
a creek-washed stone
Granite: ingrained
with torment of fire and weight
Crystal and sediment linked hot
all change, in thoughts,
As well as things.

1 week ago
#poetry

Lines For The Fortune Cookies

by Frank O’Hara

—

I think you’re wonderful and so does everyone else.

1 week ago
#poetry

"
Your word
travels
the entirety of
space
and reaches
my cells
which are
my stars
then goes to
yours
which are
my light.

Ghosts.
"

Frida Kahlo, from The Diary Of Frida Kahlo: An Intimate Self-Portrait (via violentwavesofemotion)

2 weeks ago
#poetry

3 weeks ago
#this is awesome #poetry

3 weeks ago
#YES. #poetry

"For what wears out the life of mortal men?
‘Tis that from change to change their being rolls:
‘Tis that repeated shocks, again, again,
Exhaust the energy of strongest souls,
And numb the elastic powers.
Till having us’d our nerves with bliss and teen,
And tir’d upon a thousand schemes our wit,
To the just-pausing Genius we remit
Our worn-out life, and are — what we have been."

Matthew Arnold, “The Scholar Gipsy”

3 weeks ago
#poetry #current read #My sentiments exactly.

The More Loving One

by W.H. Auden

Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.

How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.

Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.

Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.

4 weeks ago
#poetry #love #my stream of consciousness

1 month ago
#poetry

(parenthesis)

"Light is sufficient to itself."

Riprap

"Your word travels the entirety of space and reaches my cells which are my stars then goes to yours which are my light. Ghosts."

The More Loving One

Lines For The Fortune Cookies

by Frank O’Hara

I think you’re wonderful and so does everyone else.

by Frank O’Hara

I think you’re wonderful and so does everyone else.

"
Your word
travels
the entirety of
space
and reaches
my cells
which are
my stars
then goes to
yours
which are
my light.

Ghosts.
"