Venice masks

Wednesday 31 July 2013

Serranilla - Íñigo López de Mendoza

From Calatrava as I took my way
At holy Mary's shrine to kneel and pray,
And sleep upon my eyelids heavy lay,
There where the ground was very rough and wild,
I lost my path and met a peasant child:
From Finojosa, with the herds around her,
There in the fields I found her.

Tuesday 30 July 2013

With a Green Scarf - Marin Sorescu

Listen.

With a green scarf I blindfolded
the eyes of the trees
and asked them to catch me.

Monday 29 July 2013

Every church sings its own soft part - Osip Emilevich Mandelstam

Every church sings its own soft part
In the polyphony of a girl's choir,
And in the stone arches of the Assumption
I make out high, arched brows.

Sunday 28 July 2013

Conscience - Walter Wingate

'Twas a bonnie day – and a day o' dule
The day I plunkit the Sawbath schule!

Saturday 27 July 2013

The bear - Oleh Lysheha

After dining in the moonlight,
He sorted the bones —

Friday 26 July 2013

the grandmother - Humberto Ak'abal

The night begins,
when the moon
—Grandmother of the villages—
comes out with her lime-white candle
to light up the silence.

Thursday 25 July 2013

A Song for My Father - Delores Gauntlett

Against the yam-vine quiet of the garden
a nightingale stirred with my father: the lift
and fall of the pickaxe, the heaving throat
of the hidden bird exacting
the subtleties of song.
This would become the memory of high grass
brushing wet against the black waterboots.

Wednesday 24 July 2013

Tuesday 23 July 2013

Some Bright Elegance - Kayo Chingonyi

For the screwfaced in good shoes that paper
the walls of dance halls. I have little patience.
I say dance, not to be seen but to be free, your feet
are made for better things. Feel the bitterness
in you lift as it did for a six year old Bojangles
tapping a living out of Richmond beer gardens
to the delight of a crowd that wasn’t lynching
today but laughing at the quickness of the kid.

Monday 22 July 2013

The way leaves crackle - Eugene Dubnov

The way leaves crackle, snow crunches on the ears,
The way the dog scrabbles at the rustling leaves and the snow.

Sunday 21 July 2013

Imagine the scene - Bruce Levitan

If it wasn't for the
pain
You might almost think the scene
inspiring.

Saturday 20 July 2013

Maungatua - Alexander Bathgate

The spirits' mountain, such the name
The early Maori gave:
Where's his forgotten grave?
We know not; but thou'rt still the same
Gloomy and dread Maungatua.

Friday 19 July 2013

My Country - Ricardo Miró

Such a small country, spread on an isthmus
where the sky is clearer, the sun brighter;
all your music echoes within me, like the sea
in the small cell of the conch.

Thursday 18 July 2013

Life's Gifts - Olive Shriner

I saw a woman sleeping.
In her sleep she dreamt Life stood before her,
and held in each hand a gift –
in the one Love, in the other Freedom.
And she said to the woman, ‘Choose!’

Wednesday 17 July 2013

Water - Pablo Neruda

Everything on earth bristled, the bramble
pricked and the green thread
bit, the petal fell
until the only flower was the falling.

Tuesday 16 July 2013

Pour Us Wine - Amir ibn Kolthum

Rise and hold up the curved glass,
And pour us wine of the morning, of El Andar.

Monday 15 July 2013

To Lady Mori - Ikkyu

The most beautiful and truest of all women;
Her songs the fresh, pure melody of love.
A voice and sweet smile that rends my heart—
I'm in a spring forest of lovely cherry-apples.

Sunday 14 July 2013

The Crucifixion of Christ - William Topaz McGonagall

Then Pilate, the Roman Governor, took Jesus and scourged Him,
And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns, and thought it no sin
To put it on His head, while meekly Jesus stands;
They put on Him a purple robe, and smote Him with their hands.

Saturday 13 July 2013

Love Sonnet XII - Pablo Neruda

Full woman, fleshly apple, hot moon,
thick smell of seaweed, crushed mud and light,
what obscure brilliance opens between your columns?
What ancient night does a man touch with his senses?

Friday 12 July 2013

The Lake Isle of Innisfree - W. B. Yeats

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee;
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

Thursday 11 July 2013

Lesbia Railing - Catullus

Lesbia forever on me rails.
To talk of me, she never fails.
Now, hang me, but for all her art,
I find that I have gained her heart.

Tuesday 9 July 2013

Past and Future - Sarojini Naidu

The new hath come and now the old retires:
And so the past becomes a mountain-cell,
Where lone, apart, old hermit-memories dwell
In consecrated calm, forgotten yet
Of the keen heart that hastens to forget
Old longings in fulfilling new desires.

Monday 8 July 2013

To be born a man - Adela Zamudio

She works so hard
to make up for the sloth
of her husband, and in the house
(Pardon my surprise.)
he's so inept and pompous,
that of course he's the boss
because he's a man!

Sunday 7 July 2013

Curtains! - Jón Thoroddsen

It's raining roses. The angels clap and shout. God Almighty bows and smiles.
A young, inexperienced angel cannot restrain himself. He flaps his wings and shouts: Long live God Almighty. He lives!
The heavens shake with congratulatory shouts, but God Almighty pauses, biting his lip. He is eternal. He smiles and bows.

Saturday 6 July 2013

Yesterday - Nora May French

Now all my thoughts were crisped and thinned
    To elfin threads, to gleaming browns.
Like tawny grasses lean with wind
    They drew your heart across the downs.
Your will of all the winds that blew
    They drew across the world to me
To thread my whimsey thoughts of you
    Along the downs, above the sea.

Friday 5 July 2013

South - Kamau Brathwaite

But today I recapture the islands'
bright beaches:  blue mist from the ocean
rolling into the fishermen's houses.
By these shores I was born:  sound of the sea
came in at my window, life heaved and breathed in me then
with the strength of that turbulent soil.

Thursday 4 July 2013

Twilight - Joaquín Arcadio Pagaza

Slowly the sun descends at fall of night,
And rests on clouds of amber, rose and red;
The mist upon the distant mountains shed
Turns to a rain of gold and silver light.

Wednesday 3 July 2013

No One Plants Fish in the Sea - Flávio de Araújo

Cast your net, fisherman.
To wrap blue silk around the woman
praying on the wharf.
To pay for the children's notebooks.
To keep the storeowner
from turning away.

Tuesday 2 July 2013

Banquet at the Tso Family Manor - Du Fu

The windy forest is chequered
By the light of the setting,
Waning moon. I tune the lute,
Its strings are moist with dew.

Monday 1 July 2013

Matins - Charles Van Gorkom

A sickle of moon is caught
in the branches of cottonwoods
along the ice choked river.