The Hay(na)ku of Numbers - Eileen R. Tabios

One
need not
rely on anyone

A Recovered Memory of Water - Núala Ní Dhomhnaill

Sometimes when the mermaid’s daughter
is in the bathroom
cleaning her teeth with a thick brush
and baking soda
she has the sense the room is filling
with water.

The Fetch - Ciarán Carson

I woke. You were lying beside me in the double bed,
prone, your long dark hair fanned out over the downy pillow.

The heavens beaming with light - Joao Jose Nunes

The heavens beaming with light,
The earth quivering with flowers,
They sing, they greet with exquisite ardor
The birth of the Redeemer.

Let Me Relate To You - Manuel Ortiz Guerrero

Let me relate to you
The sorrow that oppresses me,

The tree beneath the earth - Karin Boye

There grows a tree beneath the earth;
a mirage pursues me,
a song of living glass, of burning silver.
Like darkness before light
must all weight melt,
where only one drop falls of the song from the leaves.

A cooking egg - T. S. Eliot

Pipit sate upright in her chair
Some distance from where I was sitting;
Views of the Oxford Colleges
Lay on the table, with the knitting.

Fertile land - Jorge Barbosa

Of banana trees, orange trees
Cashew-trees
Coffee-trees, grapes, potato plantations;

Cry of the African Child - Amie Sallah

It is my father's land
It is my mother's land
It is my home land
They call it the dark continent
We call it Africa
But I call it My Continent

Te Deum Laudamus - St Nicetas of Remisiana

We praise thee, O God, we acknowledge thee to be the Lord.
All the earth doth worship thee, the Father everlasting.

My Wound made Ablution of Gaza's Blood - Najat Zbair

The universe is empty dragging its carnage
Darkness occupies the bewilderment of things

Ol' Higue - Wordsworth McAndrew

Ol' woman wid de wrinkled skin,
Leh de ol' higue¹ wuk begin.
Put on you fiery disguise,
Ol' woman wid de weary eyes
Shed you swizzly skin.

Missing - Lee Jang-wook

I was gradually delivered to you.
I was born outside of myself.

Hazards Related to the Setting up of a Christmas Tree - Yong Shu Hoong

Today, I receive a circular with this warning:
As we celebrate the festive season, it is important
to be aware of the possible hazards…

Drown - DK Osei-Yaw

I stand my ground
Yet it slips away;
My legs kick hard,
Yet bubbles betray;

Urgent - Roberto Sosa

This afternoon a child, not even two years old,
got lost.
He’s got curls like ripples on a lake.
A pudgy little boy
with huge eyes
like a stray lamb.

None like you was ever seen or created - Imam Ahmad Raza

None like you was ever seen or created.
Authority stands in your person consummated.

OK, let’s be exiled! - Alemayehu Gebrehiwot

Yes, let’s be exiled,
far from our families,
our beloved country,
our villages, our rivers.

I got accustomed to being tired - Maia Sarishvili

I got accustomed to being tired.
It’s like having a live wolf on my back
And feeling him there like a simple schoolbag.

Andha Lamaya - Sagara Palansuriya

They say, flowers are gorgeous and are of lovely shades
The things they speak of as they can see
I don’t understand, mother, so here I am to learn
Please explain to me, I don’t know these

The Investigation - Din Mehmeti

In an ugly investigation
Our names were unveiled, pierced
By seven rusty nails.

Lunar Park - Jean Delville

Becalmed the profane noise of the crowd.
Toward the risen Moon, the symbolic Bronzes
Curve, in the blue night, their antique nudity
In the sphinx-like majesty of attitudes.

The sound of a silver bridle - Begziin Yavuuhulan

I’m waiting for my lover to arrive,
the sound of horses’ hooves pressed upon my heart.

Incarnate God, thou word divine - St Anselm

Incarnate God, thou word divine,
Both man art thou and God complete;
When as the Judge thou com'st, incline
To me, a man, thy mercy sweet.

Mother - Hadraawi

The world certainly
Would never have left night
Light not been found

Silent trees - Bo Carpelan

Will an unknown hand raise the continents
and the song transfix the bird,

For a mythology of minor things - Humberto Quino

Like one who wrinkles an old shirt
&
Goes about naked in the old cinemas

The Mother o' Shaun - Cathal O’Byrne

Shaun stood six feet or so, with his head
            up near the rafter,
He be to stoop when he came in the door,

What Polly found in her stocking - Louisa May Alcott

With the first pale glimmer,
Of the morning red,
Polly woke delighted
And flew out of bed.

I. K. - Peter Bruveris

And days lived out are our clay,
and sleepless nights – our salt; to the window
where cloud shadow just crossed, bends
a branch of lilac that bloomed this morning, like a joke

Right now, right now I would like to change - Hasso Krull

Right now, right now I would like to change
into something different. Can I? I don’t know. I
listen to the angry blizzard, a train rattles the things
on the table, then is gone. Did I change

Still Born - Enoch Timpunza Mvula

She did not come just one night:
She did not come just one month.

A Day - Alaíde Foppa

This cloudy sky
with its hidden storm
and foreshadowed rain
is weighing on me;

The crocodile - Shika Kgomedi Lekgothoane

The crocodile is the invoker of the rain waters,
The black one of the pool,
The black black one lying on the water slime;

The Weeping Lady of Kinshasa - Don Too Heng Onn

Have You By Chance Spied From Far
The Weeping Lady of Kinshasa
Each Time I Pass Her By
The Inside of Me Cry

Believe It or Not - Reesom Haile

Remember the Italians
Who invaded and said
Eat but don't speak?

Bermudas - Kamau Brathwaite

First the dark meer
begins to breathe gently into green
into light & light green
until there are like blue

Heu! quid jaces stabulo - John Mauburne

Ah! how humble is thy birth
    In the lowly manger,
Thou the Lord of heaven and earth,
    Weeping as a stranger;
If a King indeed art thou,
Where is all thy glory now?
    Where thy halls of splendour?
Here is nought but poverty,
Barren need and penury,
    Little child so tender.

You Leave with Something of Mine - Medardo Ángel Silva

You leave with something of mine the afternoons you go away…
The pain of loving is the pain of living
and the drizzle in an ancient passageway
invades me with the infinite desire to sob.

Good gods - Elancharan Gunasekaran

Good
gods

The Children - Qassim Haddad

Those many children
who frolic around you
Have you chosen names for them
or will you leave the naming to the gardens?

Tragedy - Recaredo Silebo Boturu

The Okume’s leaves
began to fall
little by little
&,
the wind appeared
to take them like ashes
to the cosmos,
on that night.

Kassaman (We Pledge) - Moufdi Zakaria

We swear by the lightning that destroys,
By the streams of generous blood being shed,
By the bright flags that wave,
Flying proudly on the high mountains,
That we have risen up, and whether we live or die,
We are resolved that Algeria shall live -
So be our witness—be our witness—be our witness!

Green Spirit - Eunice Ngongkum

Foremost flame of our unique earth
tree hugger Wangari Maathai
now gone one to be with the earth

Art Thou Weary? - St. Stephen the Sabaite

Art thou weary, art thou languid,
  Art thou sore distrest?
“Come to Me,” saith One, “and coming
        Be at rest!”

You Have Closed Your Eyes - Giuseppe Ungaretti

A night is born
full of false holes
dead sounds
like the corks
of nets trailed in the water.

The Genius - Leonard Cohen

For you
I will be a ghetto jew
and dance
and put white stockings
on my twisted limbs
and poison wells
across the town

I’ll never lend a book again no matter what - Eustache Deschamps

My books are now lent out in many a place
to people I was sure would have the grace
to give them back, but they’re long overdue.

On the Pulse of Morning - Maya Angelou

A Rock, A River, A Tree
Hosts to species long since departed,
Marked the mastodon.
The dinosaur, who left dry tokens
Of their sojourn here
On our planet floor,
Any broad alarm of their hastening doom
Is lost in the gloom of dust and ages.

The Jester - Margaret Widdemer

I have known great gold Sorrows:
Majestic Griefs shall serve me watchfully
Through the slow-pacing morrows:

Dialect of Hurricanes - Frankétienne

          Every day I use the dialect of lunatic hurricanes.
I speak the madness of clashing winds.

Partake - Ceaití Ní Bheildiúin

The hill speaks:

If you are defenceless, come
close to my side and sanctuary;
if you are short of blessings, come
to drink from my wellsprings;
if you are in need of a hiding place, come
under the veil of my mists.

Nothing Exists Per Se Except Atoms and the Void - Lucretius

But, now again to weave the tale begun,
All nature, then, as self-sustained, consists
Of twain of things: of bodies and of void
In which they're set, and where they're moved around.

all because i loved you - Olu Oguibe

once i wrote with the irreverence of youth
and the fire of a heart burning to ash
i plucked words like faggots from blazing coal
and on the anvil of exile i hammered sorrow into verse
the burden of your suffering tore poetry from my flesh
and on the night of your hanging there was dust in my lines
i aimed for song and there was not an eye without tears

Prison Art - Marí Peté

Sugarcane hills cradle Eshowe
this warm winter’s afternoon.
I enter into a quiet room,
step closer to counterpoints
caged by frames:

Hummingbird - Yearn Hong Choi

1
A tiny bird’s long beak is
penetrating into the nectar of an oasis tree’s flower
on the New Mexico desert.

The Boat - Augusta Peaux

With the wing of an eagle, so wide,
the sail of the boat on the stream
strikes to death the sun in the room
and all that remains is a gleam.

Sea Breeze - Stéphane Mallarmé

The flesh is sad, alas, and there’s nothing but words!
To take flight, far off! I sense that somewhere the birds
Are drunk to be amid strange spray and skies.

The Day is Past and Over - St. Anatolius

The day is past and over;
  All thanks, O Lord, to Thee;
I pray Thee now that sinless
  The hours of dark may be:
O Jesu, keep me in Thy sight,
And guard me through the coming night.

Mother - Guido Gezelle

No picture now
is left to me.
no portrait here
     below,

Song of the Sampo: The Song of Creation - Elias Lönnrot

The Lapp with the crooked back
Fostered an ancient feud,
A spite from long past time
Against old Väinämöinen.

unknown - Lynn Paden

only remembered
when needed

Child Who Dances For the Wedding - Vagif Bayatly Oner

Child, who dances for the wedding of the neighbour
Ten houses away,
Under the leaf of a rose,
In the shape of a rose petal,

Murder of an African nation - Annie Moyo

You are a third world capitalist leader;
With a thousand words spoken yet not one with meaning,

Dedication - Wole Soyinka

Earth will not share the rafter's envy; dung floors
Break, not the gecko's slight skin, but its fall
Taste this soil for death and plumb her deep for life

Prayer of Eugenius

Monarch of infinite majesty, Maker and Lord of creation,
Feeble and vile at thy feet I dare to implore thee for favours; —

from Alasdair of Glengarry - Sìleas na Ceapaich

You were the yew above every forest,
You were the strong steadfast oak,

The Swan - Gavrila Romanovich Derzhavin

I'll leave the mortal world behind,
Take wing in an flight fantastical,
With singing, my eternal soul
Will rise up swan-like in the air.

I met four guinea-hens - Alfred Francis Kreymborg

I met four guinea-hens today,
Creaking like pulleys.

Lullaby of the Onion - Miguel Hernández

The onion is frost
shut in and poor.
Frost of your days
and of my nights.
Hunger and onion,
black ice and frost
large and round.

Exhortation to Battle - Callinus

How long will ye slumber? when will ye take heart
And fear the reproach of your neighbours at hand?

The Sea-Migrations - Caasha Lul Mohamud Yusuf

Declaiming this poem, a gabay¹, I alliterate in D to start debate,
to disseminate, to disclose to you: the public.
Hey, you - be diligent! I'm trying though it's difficult
to destroy the injustice, demolish the status quo.
Sea-migration disables my people, I want to drive it back.

Vondel's Lucifer (Act I, lines 122-172) - Joost van den Vondel

Apollion:
No creature hath on high mine eye so pleased
As those below. Who could so subtly soul
With body weave and two-fold Angels form
From clay and bone? The body's shapely mould
Attests the Maker's art, that in the face,
The mirror of the mind, doth best appear.

My sweet youthfulness is gone - Pierre de Ronsard

My sweet youthfulness is gone,
my early strength is broken;
I have black teeth and white hair;

A stir for Seacole - Anonymous

Dame Seacole was a kindly old soul,
And a kindly old soul was she;
You might call for your pot, you might call for your pipe,
In her tent on "the Col" so free.

i’d like you to go with me - Ana Paula Inácio

i’d like you to go with me
through life
like a sail

An Old Woman of the Roads - Padraic Colum

O, to have a little house!
    To own the hearth and stool and all!
The heaped up sods upon the fire,
    The pile of turf against the wall!

The Winter Galaxy - Charles Heavysege

The stars are glittering in the frosty sky,
Numerous as pebbles on a broad sea-coast;

Her Granddaughter Learns the Alphabet - Olive Senior

I myself had learnt the alphabet, once, long ago,
in a place that was small and known.
But my forgetfulness has grown.

No Traces Left - Rajathi Salma

There are objects
everywhere in this room.

Vases await
the visitor’s gaze.

Praise of Peace - Bacchylides

To mortal men Peace giveth these good things:
Wealth, and the flowers of honey-throated song;
      The flame that springs
On carven altars from fat sheep and kine,

Oh pearl of the nose-ring - Bihari Lal

Oh pearl of the nose-ring, thrice blessed are you;
there is no limit to your good fortune!

Corinna in Vendome - Pierre de Ronsard

Darling, each morning a blooded rose
Lures the sunlight in, and shows
Her soft, moist and secret part.
See now, before you go to bed,
Her skirts replaced, her deeper red —
A colour much like yours, dear heart.

The Shark - E.J. Pratt

He seemed to know the harbour,
So leisurely he swam;
His fin,
Like a piece of sheet-iron,
Three-cornered,
And with knife-edge,
Stirred not a bubble
As it moved
With its base-line on the water.

We did it - Yehuda Amichai

We did it before the mirror
And in the light. We did it in darkness,
In the water, and in the high grass.

I have in heaven a friend - Nils Frykman

I have in heaven, a Friend so good,
He has redeemed me, with His own blood,
From Satan, and this world of sin;
He always hears when I make request,
A crown He's promised, the very best,
Which I may wear there, with joy and zest,
When I eternal life shall win.

Legs on the Signpost - Tomaž Šalamun

The insane devotee throbs with his
small legs, I don’t dare more.

As if you'd remember - Raúl Gómez Jattin

As if you'd remember Isabel
of the hopscotch underneath your patio’s mamoncillo tree
of the rag dolls that were our children

Not loved enough - Suniti Namjoshi

Not loved enough, nor yet quite lost,
No longer fought for, nor yet forgot,

What The Old Man Said - Cicely Fox Smith

"Don't you take no sail off 'er,"
The Ol' Man said,
Wind an' sea rampagin'
Fit to wake the dead, —

Evening Cloud - Gaarriye

Setting sun you're slipping
From the fading day
Heading for your hole
Hey! Are you a coward?

Elene: Part I - Cynewulf

Swift in the tale of time had fleeted
      Hundreds two and thirty-three
Winters for the world completed,
      Since heaven’s Lord in low degree
In this mid-earth a man was born
To shed o’er faithful hearts a heavenly morn.

Dust we are return to it we must - Imam Ahmad Raza

Dust we are return to it we must
Adam, our ancestor, was created from dust

Sonnet - Willem Kloos

I always think of you as of a dream
In which, all through the long blest night, a face
I never saw smiles at me with a grace
No words can paint, till at the first shy gleam

The Origin of Trade - Voltaire

When with a skillful hand Prometheus made
A statue that the human form displayed,

Pandora, his own work, to wed he chose,
And from those two the human race arose.

The Boat That Brought Me - Azita Ghahreman

Behind these eyes that look like mine
old names are fading away, the past lies crumpled in my clenched fist -
a coppery bird in coppery wind,
this vast place has covered me from head to toe.

he locks the car and knows... Kees Ouwens

I haven’t yet been allotted to death
the horizon still keeps its distance
across the triple verge – the middle,
the edges – the ripe light
strokes down, the open pulse

Grass is growing in the east - Tsogdorjin Bavuudorj

Grass, growing in the east
in yellow waves, and
kneeling and bowing

Trieste - Umberto Saba

I traversed the whole city.
Then climbed a hill
crowded at first, in the end deserted,

Consecration - Muireadhach Albanach Ó Dálaigh

How great the tale, that there should be,
In God's Son's heart, a place for me!

Song of the Forest Trees - Standish Hayes O'Grady

O man that for Fergus of the feasts dost kindle fire,
Whether afloat or ashore burn not the king of woods.

"Fire" Second State : Voice of Agony - Rogelio Sinán

- Give me your breeze, oh sea, your pure breeze to appease my voice and my inner core!
- Give me Lord your grace and your lungs to hold fast their air with my veins!

Venus' Rose-Garden - Publius Annius Florus

Venus a garden had, rose-bushes round —
Its lady's darling plot; once seen, beloved.

Away from Ireland - Cathal O’Byrne

Though I’m far and very far away from Ireland,
There’s a. knot. of purple thistles on a cliff above the sea,
Like a silver censer flaming between the sky and me,
The blood-red bells of fuchsias swing around a cabin door,
Where the yellow sunlight showers down to flood the earthen floor,
Far away, and very far away in Ireland.

The Stamp of Civilization - Max Nordau

Japan hath Western culture? So you say. O vain sophistic thought!

Summons to Youth - Rudolph Altrocchi

Exultant youths who would bewail or vaunt
   The odds of love, no longer waste your breath:

Alpha et Omega, Magne Deus - Hildebert of Lavardin

First and last, great God, before thee
Come we humbly to adore thee,
Thou, whose power is all sufficient,
Lord omnipotent, omniscient,

Even now I cannot help thinking of them - George Szirtes

Even now I cannot help thinking of them
as historical. The noise they make drowns
out the radio static of the street. Grey gowns
of rain flutter or run away in a million gem
spectacular but these dark suns expand

Mother, give me my Girdhari - Mira Bai

Mother, give me my Girdhari,
My mountain-bearer!

Green Gully - Wang Wei

If I want to reach Yellow Flower river
I always Follow Green Gully stream;
It coils through the mountains
      with ten thousand turnings,

Gift - Tamim al-Barghouti

My life is a gift
Given to me
On my zero birthday.
Today I pulled out the ribbon,
Unwrapped the Box
And found lots of things,

Sleep - Paul Kester

If I pass between thy shadowy portals
Fearlessly;
I go, where, for a little space
No echo of the world's tumult
Shall awake

The Quiet Snow - Raymond Knister

The quiet snow
Will splotch
Each in the row of cedars

The Community that Lies Between - Andrew King

Somewhere between what is
and what will be,
between this present world
and a world redeemed,

Four times azure and five - Habib Tengour

Sand stone or mineral ultramarine blue
memory attaches to its rays
frail trace of a camp
to cross our lives set out in a mirror
just as hachures fade to grey
and the sky is colour sterile

Harbour - Maung Chaw Nwe

They will land here.
A tree or two or three.
A ship or two or three.
Sceneries will land.
Fortuities will land.

Litanies of the Rose - Remy de Gourmont

Rose with dark eyes,
mirror of your nothingness,
rose with dark eyes,
make us believe in the mystery,
hypocrite flower,
flower of silence.

In Childhood - Kimiko Hahn

things don't die or remain damaged
but return: stumps grow back hands,
a head reconnects to a neck,
a whole corpse rises blushing and newly elastic.

For Esther - Bruce Levitan

Nothing so special as blood of my blood,
Infinity sleeps in the new born's repose;
Tiny hands clenched, lips like a rosebud,
Perfect in form; and mother's smile glows.

I want to say - Daiva Cepauskaite

I want to say — I'm in love
but I feel ashamed
of making such a fool of myself,
so I say — I hate.

Above the world - Magnus Felix Ennodius

Above the world the deepening pall
Of gloomy night begins to fall;
And every heart that languisheth,
May gain new life from seeming death.

The Wayver of Wellbrook - Ben Brierley

Yo gentlemen o with yor heaunds an yor parks,
Yo may gamble an sport till yo dee;
Bo a quiet heause nook, a good wife, an a book,
Is mooar to the likins o mee.

Beyond the Sun - Andrey Belyi

The world-gold sunset is ablaze with fire,
Having pierced through with radiant airiness,
above the peaceful cornfield it set fire to crosses
and distant outlines of cupolas.

The Prayer of the Dog - Carmen Bernos de Gasztold

Lord,
I keep watch!
If I am not here
who will guard their house?

To the Muse - Aleksandr Blok

In your hidden memories
There are fatal tidings of doom
A curse on sacred traditions,
A desecration of happiness;

We Have Astonished - Pierre-Jean Jouve

We have astonished by our great suffering
The inclination of indifferent stars

The Wisdom of Dede Korkut - Dede Korkut

Unless one calls on God, no work prospers;
         unless God grants, no man grows rich.

Ascension - Ric Ohge

The elect stand
in the holies,
hidden in the
shrines and temples,
the places of power,
of old names-older ones
still, forgotten in the
dust of those fallen.

Street Scene by L.S. Lowry - Henry Graham

L.S. Lowry
is my name
painting streets
is my game

Before the Convent of Yuste, 1556 - August von Platen-Hallermünde

’Tis night, and storms continually roar,
Ye monks of Spain, unbar for me the door.

Wynken, Blynken, and Nod - Eugene Field

 Wynken, Blynken, and Nod one night
   Sailed off in a wooden shoe,—
Sailed on a river of crystal light
   Into a sea of dew.
“Where are you going, and what do you wish?”
   The old moon asked the three.
“We have come to fish for the herring-fish
   That live in this beautiful sea;
   Nets of silver and gold have we,"
            Said Wynken,
            Blynken,
            And Nod.

Narcissist Advice Column - Hinemoana Baker

Pepper blacks the pan so never shake it near me.
Wait for the flagrant animation in my bedroom, in my bed base.

Naming The Dawn - Rafael Alberti

               With gentle red assaults, Dawn, I was granting you names:
Mistaken dream, Angel without exit, Falsehood of rain in the trees.

the stone collector’s song - Sjón

i remember the thirst and the darkness
i remember one-way streets
i remember closed alleys
and you

O Splendour of God's Glory Bright - - Ambrose of Milan (Augusta Treverorum)

O splendour of God’s glory bright,
From light eternal bringing light,
Thou Light of light, light’s living Spring,
True Day, all days illumining.

Poems: VIII - Publius Annius Florus

'Tis as bad possessing money as to live in penury;
Just as bad perpetual daring as perpetual modesty;

The Lonely Hunter - Fiona MacLeod

Green branches, green branches, I see you beckon; I follow!
Sweet is the place you guard, there in the rowan-tree hollow.

She of the Garden - Emile Verhaeren

In such a spot, with radiant flowers for halo,
I saw the Guardian Angel sit her down;
Vine-branches fashioned a green shrine above her
And sun-flowers rose behind her like a crown.

Summer Colours - Fenny Sterenborg

Long curls
lightest blond
like silver and gold
in the saffron sun

Mind Games - Dimitris Varos

I am a waterfall in the desert.
A rain from a cloudless sky.
A well known but unborn child.
An insistence experience
that you never had.

The Guardian Angel - Bruna Digregorio

When you have been bathed
in scented water,
when your limbs
have been caressed
by sweet oils

Poverty Poem - Frank Joussen

It looks like the idyll from the Kipling story.
There are the huts, the dusty field paths,
peopled with sari girls
carrying milk, water, firewood,
the cooking women and the chatting men.
And at night the beast roams freely,
restlessly circling the sleeping village.
But the beast is inside, not outside,

Naval Engineering - Víctor Rodríguez Núñez

The wheel's star
                            freshly cut
from night's garden

This Lane - Andrew Young

Years and years and man’s thoughtful foot,
Drip and guttering rains and mute
Shrinkage of snows, and shaggy-hoofed
Horse have sunk this lane tree-roofed
Now patched with blossoming elder,
Wayfaring-tree and guelder;
Lane that eases the sharp-scarped hill
Winding the slope with leisurely will.

Lyme Regis – Golden Cap - Anne Ridler

The Cobb curves like a fossil, ridged and gray.
That sickle hook, which once held navies in its crook,
Still shields the town, and reaps the golden stalks
That spring in the wave;

Stories of the Armadillo - Fabio Pusterla

Good morning, says the armadillo to a street sweeper. Did you happen
to see an opossum go by?
The man raises his broom towards the north, where a cloud
hovers over the desert like a great mountain. The armadillo
thanks him and sets off against the wind.

To a sea-cliff - Thomas Hardy

Lend me your ear
While I read to you here
A page from your history,
Old cliff — not known
To your solid stone
Yet yours inseparably.

Broken Shell - Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Cease searching for the perfect shell, the whole
Inviolate form no tooth of time has cracked;
The alabaster armor still intact
From sand’s erosion and the breaker’s roll.

Mangroves - Kenneth Slessor

These black bush-waters, heavy with crusted boughs
Like plumes above dead captains, wake the mind...

Whited Sepulchre - John Ngong Kum Ngong

I know whited sepulchre
you do not feel anymore
the touch of our done fingers
which for want of acceptance
cling to the wall of furore.
For close to sixty years
now we have lived like internees
working our fingers to the bone
for idiots to reap the harvest.

Watching the River Flow - Jaime Saenz

When the hour comes I'll speak with you, watching the river flow, at the river's edge.

I Have A White Rose To Tend (Verse XXXIX) - José Martí

I have a white rose to tend
In July as in January;

Teach Me Peace - Nathan

Mother, teach me peace.
Everyone is making war, and we hardly ever see peace.
At school, I learn these things…

Mother Africa - Ribka Sibhatu

Cradle of mankind
baobab of the soul,
in your savannahs
and sacred forests
death dances.

The Fence - Lenrie Peters

There where the dim past and future mingle
their nebulous hopes and aspirations
there I lie.

A left hand made verse 1 - Kato Javakhishvili

As human creatures do not recognize each other
I think: it’s time for us to stand one after another.
And some time ago, - it was when
I was wrapped in your body as in the wool blanket

Caudal (The Fortune) - Miguel Ángel Asturias

To give is to love,
To give prodigiously:
For every drop of water
To return a torrent.

This Is The Dark Time, My Love - Martin Carter

This is the dark time, my love,
All round the land brown beetles crawl about
The shining sun is hidden in the sky

No words - Olufunke Kolapo

Today, I have no words
Qualified enough to describe
The depth of my pain

To the cushag's friend - Cushag

O the cushag flower in a fairy bower
Would shine like a star of gold;
But when it grows in the farmer’s close
‘Tis a shocking weed, we’re told.
Yet common things
May have their wings
To help our souls above;
And wayside weeds,
Like kindly deeds,
Spring from a father’s love.

The High Peak - Bruce Levitan

A mown field with black-wrapped bales
Like pieces from a checkers game, thrown by a giant;
A sky of monochromes: chalks and shales
Arching above the High Peak hills, brooding and defiant;

Where am I from? - Fatoumata Diallo

Where am I from?
I come from these people who get up with cows

Unsung Hero - Mwiza Mnyuma Sambo Mhango

"O God, bless our land of Malawi."
a prayer for a warm-hearted nation,

For Us, Life - Jang Jin-sung

Every morning
when I wake
I shake my brother
to and fro – his lungs are weak.

Sea Grapes - Derek Walcott

That sail which leans on light,
tired of islands,
a schooner beating up the Caribbean

If on a Winter’s Night a Traveller - Moncef Ouahibi

In the morning, when water was falling in threads, I was putting my first sentence in order
I would write it and cross it out to write it

A Memory - Yi Chongbo

I'll never forget the boy
who slept here last night.

One Day In June - Ebrahim Al-Arrayedh

One day in June
Her shapely hand was raised, and waving still
To those colourful columns filing past

"Fire" First State: Voice of Panic - Rogelio Sinán

Soundless, moanless, wordless sirens
silent song that was heard by death alone
nailed agonies into the night.

Phobia - Abigail Lim

The tears I shed tonight
Are not ones of sadness
It’s a stunning realisation
Of what I fear most
That one day you’ll betray me

Slow Dance - Charles Mwewa

Like two pieces of a jigsaw puzzle,
Flesh to flesh, skin to skin

Night Has Fallen - Raage Ugaas

Night had fallen and behind closed doors everyone was sleeping
Thunder called out with a clamour of rain like shots from a thousand rifles

Veni Creator Spiritus - Charlemagne

Creator Spirit, by whose aid
The world’s foundations first were laid,
Come, visit every pious mind;
Come, pour thy joys on human kind;
From sin and sorrow set us free,
And make thy temples worthy thee.

Promenade of Solitary Death - Edouard Glissant

The sad boy has not moved
On a lake of roses, strewn
With pale bodies in the rosebushes
Funereal bay it has remained

Namibia - Mvula Ya Nangolo

I’ve returned here for many a reason
I’ll certainly live here for many a season
Like thousands of others I hear its heartbeat
My heart opens up when I am in the mountains
Where I can be alone with my thoughts

What are you doing, soul? - Petrarch

“What are you doing, soul? What do you think?
Will we have peace? A truce? Or always war?”—
"I do not know our future, but I see
our torment doesn't please her lovely eyes.”—

Point Cristina and Point Fernanda - Marcelo Ensema Nsang

Album of doves
that comes to coo
the sister couple
who sleep in the sea.

And You Never Forgot - Ali Podrimja

Here and there beyond barred windows
Chasing you people forgot themselves

An Elder’s Prayer - Bai T. Moore

Oh great Spirit of the forest,
I have nothing in my hand
But a chicken and some rice

Jesu, Dulcis Memoria - Bernard of Clairvaux

Jesu, the very thought of Thee
With sweetness fills the breast;
But sweeter far Thy Face to see,
And in Thy Presence rest.

Animal Crackers - Richard de Zoysa

“Draw me a lion.”
So I set my pen
to work. Produce a lazy, kindly beast . . .
Colour it yellow.

Skeete's Bay, Barbados - Robert Lee

One always missed the turning, but found, in time
The broken sign that pointed crookedly, loath to
Allow another stranger here. Perhaps this Tom

My Tabriz - Suleyman Rustam

I never get tired of looking at your beauty,
My Tabriz¹, my Tabriz, my gorgeous Tabriz!

Metempsychosis - Juan Ramón Molina

I was a fish in the mirrors of the sonorous ocean wide,
where I beheld the glimmer of gems and metals;
that is the reason why I love the foam, the sourly
rocky shores, the briny gales, and the vivid choral reefs.

After the Deluge - Ingmāra Balode

the first such spring after the deluge —
i do not see you squint once.

Emigrant - Corsino Fortes

Every evening, sunset crooks
             its thumb across the island
And from the sunset to the thumb
             there grows
             a path of dead stone

Not thou from us, O Lord, but we - Richard Chenevix Trench

Not Thou from us, O Lord, but we
Withdraw ourselves from Thee.

One eye crystal, one eye flame - Mimi Khalvati

One eye crystal, one eye flame, it arrives
by stealth. Carrying tatters in its jaw,

Where have the mushrooms gone? - Timothy Wangusa

My kinsmen, where have the mushrooms gone?
Where have all the mushrooms gone?
That sprouted in homestead and everywhere?

Country Peace - Mahmud Yussop

The rustling leaves
bring that wondrous feeling
the town people miss
called country peace.

The Guelder-Rose - Lesia Ukrainka

The Cossack is dying, the maiden crying:
"Let me stay beside you, deep in earth I would be lying!"

A very big white elephant - Tsogdorjin Bavuudorj

A very big, white elephant
Has passed through the world.

City in the East - Emma Moughabghab

At the centre, upon the peak of the grey hill,
you hold the beating heart of the gyroscope;
it goes round and round and back again:
surrounded by fleeting shadows of multiple lives,
it melts in the summer heat in an iridescent simulation
of the shimmering lights and whispering voices of the city.

I am legion - Andrew King

I am the lost one trapped in depression;
I am the broken one trapped in my rage;
I am the hurting soul chained to addiction;
I am self-harmer abused at young age –

Clock - Pierre Reverdy

In the warm air of the ceiling the footlights of dreams are illuminated.

Second to none - George Cosbuc

Her shoulders with fair braids are graced,
Lithe as the wheat-stem is her waist,
Her sable apron laced with taste —
She's all in all for me.
When she is near, I take alarm;
When she is off, I come to harm;
When others take her by the arm,
Priests pray to set me free!

The First Book of the Æneis (lines 1-18) - Vergil

Arms, and the man I sing, who, forc’d by fate,
And haughty Juno’s unrelenting hate,
Expell’d and exil’d, left the Trojan shore.

Bruno Bends, Falls (1) - Raúl Zurita

In front the mountains emerge like a fine gauze
that curves over the shadows. The snow of the
cordillera phosphoresces lightly, like a gauze
that floats. Above, the infinite stars and the black
sky. Words are tenuous, the stars are tenuous.

A Girl Strike-Leader - Florence Kiper Frank

A white-faced, stubborn little thing
Whose years are not quite twenty years;
Eyes steely now and done with tears,
Mouth scornful of its suffering—

Song of the Search - Constance Lindsay Skinner

I descend through the forest alone.
Rose-flushed are the willows, stark and a-quiver,
In the warm sudden grasp of Spring;
Like a woman when her lover has suddenly, swiftly taken her.
I hear the secret rustle of the little leaves,

Morning Hymn - St Hilary

Hymnum Dicat Turba Fralrum

Raise the song, O band of brothers,
Let the holy anthem ring;
Sound the hymn of loud laudation,
Unto Christ, our Lord and King.

The Wives of Weinsberg - Gottfried Augüst Bürger

Which way to Weinsberg? neighbour, say!
  ’T is sure a famous city:
It must have cradled, in its day,
Full many a maid of noble clay,
  And matrons wise and witty;
And if ever marriage should happen to me,
A Weinsberg dame my wife shall be.

The London Convict Maid - Anonymous

Ye London maids attend to me,
While I relate my misery,
Through London streets I oft have stray'd,
But now I am a Convict Maid.

Poor Will’s in Ruthin Gaol - I.D. Hooson

Poor Will’s in Ruthin Gaol,
Dejected and depressed,
His net and gun are lying
Redundant in a chest;

The Fox And The Grapes - Jean de La Fontaine

Rosy and ripe, and ready to box,
The grapes hang high o'er the hungry Fox.—
He pricks up his ears, and his eye he cocks.

First they came - Martin Niemöller

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.

City That Does Not Sleep - Federico Garcia Lorca

In the sky there is nobody asleep.  Nobody, nobody.
Nobody is asleep.
The creatures of the moon sniff and prowl about their cabins.
The living iguanas will come and bite the men who do not dream,
and the man who rushes out with his spirit broken will meet on the street corner
the unbelievable alligator quiet beneath the tender protest of the stars.

Song in the Chalcan Style - Tetlepanquetzanitzin

Lord of the Waters, god and friend,
I weep with anguish at your side.

Other men ride high on horses - Wang Fanzhi

Other men ride high on horses,
A donkey I straddle, poor, poor me.

the sleepers wake inside the dream - Galina Rymbu

the sleepers wake inside the dream, the awakened
doze on iron fainting couches, in the burrows of moles.
the politics of absence plays cards with itself.
inside every sign is a hallway, straight, down which
you walk alone.

The Nine Muses - Publius Annius Florus

Clio records past ages in her prose.
Euterpe's hollow reed makes double sound.

African tears - Nametso Dorothy Phonchi

African tears are beautiful,
We were born crying before we knew time,
Our tears are beautiful like sun rays
like the moon and the stars,

To God - Gregory Nanzianzen

O Thou, the One supreme o’er all!
  For by what other name
May we upon thy greatness call,
  Or celebrate thy fame?

The Boar Hunt (The Hunter and the Hero - Book X) - Bhāravi

The Boar with wondrous strength endowed
     In its deep tusks and mighty jaw, —
As if to tear the firm set rocks, —
     With glaring eyes great Arjun saw!

Pompholyx - Seyi Adigun

If I were not your sister
I would curse you.
If I were not your brethren’s friend
I would cast upon you
a spell.

In a Herber Green Asleep Whereas I Lay - Robert Wever

In a herber green asleep whereas I lay,
The birds sang sweet in the midds of the day;
I dreamed fast of mirth and play:
    In youth is pleasure, in youth is pleasure.

The yellow bittern - Thomas MacDonagh

The yellow bittern that never broke out
In a drinking-bout, might well have drunk;
His bones are thrown on a naked stone
Where he lived alone like a hermit monk.

De Spectaculis.II (Here where, rayed with stars) - Marcus Valerius Martialis

Here where, rayed with stars,
the Colossus^[1] views heaven anear,

A Sketch For A Modern Love Poem - Tadeusz Różewicz

And yet whiteness
can be best described by greyness
a bird by a stone
sunflowers
in december

To the women at the grave - Peter Damian

To the women at the grave,
Tidings sweet the angel gave,
"Christ is risen; haste away,

A Face To Face Encounter With A Lion - Al-Mutanabbi

Behold a rosy lion! when seeking out a lake to drink
His roar resounds as far as the Euphrates and the Nile River
Heavily stained with the blood of his quarries
Attired in the thick hair of his luxurious mane
He seems surrounded by a dense forest

My poet friends - Rafael Felipe Oteriño

My poet friends are like children in an airport:
they run from one counter to another asking for information
they immediately forget,

The King of Noon and the Lord of Bells - Carl Spitteler

The forest opens wide its spacious leafy gate
And through, on puissant steed, the Noon King rides in state.
At the brave sight the sun slackens his proud career,
The mountains stretch their necks, the massy clouds uprear,
Waving their streaming flags athwart the azure dome.

Nature’s Nature - Paramahansa Yogananda

Away, ye muses, all away!
Away with songs of finch and fay.
Away the jaundiced sight
That magnifies the firefly’s light
To bonfire bright;

Upon Green Hills - Sergei Yesenin

Upon green hills wild droves of horses blow
The golden bloom off of the days that go.

Water Song - Solomon Ibn Gabirol

The feats's begun
And the Wine is done,
So my sad tears run
    Like streams of water, streams of water.

Requests - Digby Mackworth-Dolben

I asked for Peace,—
My sins arose
And bound me close,
I could not find release.

Twenty Gallons of Sleep - Agnes L. Storrie

Measure me out from the fathomless tun
  That somewhere or other you keep
In your vasty cellars, O wealthy one,
  Twenty gallons of sleep.

To Dante - Guido Cavalcanti

Returning from its daily quest, my Spirit
  Changed thoughts and vile in thee doth weep to find:

Seivin Verses for GMB - William Hershaw

They are fermin the fower winds:
Five grey- stemmed daffodils
on the hill abuin Eynhallow
that whirlmagig air intil pouer.

The battle between Earl Rognvald and Earl Thorfinn - Arnórr Jarlaskáld

I saw both my goldbestowers,
Each the other s henchmen hewing,
On the fitful firth of Pentland;

Hamnavoe Market - George Mackay Brown

They drove to the Market with ringing pockets.

Folster found a girl
Who put wounds on his face and throat,
Small and diagonal, like red doves.

Orkney / This Life - Andrew Greig

It is big sky and its changes,
the sea all round and the waters within.
It is the way sea and sky
work off each other constantly,
like people meeting in Alfred Street,
each face coming away with a hint
of the other's face pressed in it.
It is the way a week-long gale
ends and folk emerge to hear
a single bird cry way high up.

As toward the Ascrean Mount - Giambattista Felice Zappi

As toward the Ascrean mount I take my way
  Attending Glory at my right I hail;—

Roses in Springtime - Publius Annius Florus

Roses are here at last: thanks to the mood
Of lovely Spring, one day shows barbs of bloom;

The Seeking of Self - Vyacheslav Ivanov

Dying, the seed will discover the self it finds in the losing.

White Paper - Sydney Jephcott

Snowy-smooth beneath the pen—
  Richest field that iron ploughs,
Germinating thoughts of men,
  Tho’ no heaven its rain allows.

Clear air - Gabriel Rosenstock

You came from clear air
Pure sky
Of our being

Words - Charles Harpur

Words are deeds. The words we hear
May revolutionize or rear
A mighty state. The words we read
May be a spiritual deed

Cuttin’ Rushes - Moira O’Neill

Oh, maybe it was yesterday, or fifty years ago!
  Meself was risin’ early on a day for cuttin’ rushes.

Had I a Golden Pound - Francis Ledwidge

Had I a golden pound to spend,
My love should mend and sew no more.
And I would buy her a little quern,
Easy to turn on the kitchen floor.

I Will Not Have You Think Me Less - Santob de Carrion

I Will not have you think me less
  Than others of my faith,
Who live on a generous king’s largess,
  Forsworn at every breath.

Postscript - Anne M’Vicar Grant

Jean, fetch that heap of tangled yarn,
And bring those stockings here to darn,
And get from Anne the dairy keys,
That I may go and count my cheese;

Ca’ the Yowes - Isobel Pagan

Ca’ the yowes to the knowes,
Ca’ them whare the heather grows,
Ca’ them whare the burnie rows,
    My bonnie dearie.

Mountain and Valley - Friedrich Adolf Krummacher

On Alpine heights the love of God is shed;
    He paints the morning red,
    The flowerets white and blue,
    And feeds them with his dew.
On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells.

The Yokel and the Light-o’-Love - Theocritus

When I would kiss Eunice, loud laughed she,
And taunting cried: ‘Thou boor, begone from me!
Would’st kiss me, wretch?—I cannot kiss a clown—
No lips press I but such as hail from town.

The Ballad of Guibour - Frédéric Mistral

At Arles in the Carlovingian days,
        By the swift Rhone water,
A hundred thousand on either side,
Christian and Saracen, fought till the tide
        Ran red with the slaughter.

Why Sighest Thou? - Cino da Pistoia

“Why sighest thou?” Ah! ask not why;
  But late the tidings I have known,
  And all my wishes shattered lie:

Birthday recollection - Bruce Levitan

It is my birthday,
a day of recollections...

Wounded of Love - Bonaggiunta Urbisani

Wounded, I pray my wounder to beware
  Lest me, by plucking out her barb, she slay;
For many dying I have seen, that were
  Not killed by wound, but weapon drawn away.

The Hen - Matthias Claudius

A famous hen ’s my story’s theme,
  Which ne’er was known to tire
Of laying eggs, but then she ’d scream
So loud o’er every egg, ’t would seem
  The house must be on fire.

The Mountain Boy - Johann Ludwig Uhland

The shepherd of the Alps am I,
The castles far beneath me lie;
Here first the ruddy sunlight gleams,
Here linger last the parting beams.
      The mountain boy am I!

The Lives of Poets - José Emilio Pacheco

In poetry there’s no happy ending.
Poets end up
living their madness.

The Challenge of the Guns - A.N. Field

By day, by night, along the lines their dull boom rings,

A Day In The Life Of A Little Angel - Emad Fouad

The angel wakes up
every morning
like an ordinary soldier
He gets trained in good deeds
and guiding lost souls

“Look,” mother says - Anna Kamienska

“Look,” mother says in my dream,
“Look, a bird soars up to the clouds.

Hail the Resurrection day - John of Da­mas­cus (John Mansur)

Hail the Resurrection day,
Let the people shout for gladness;
'Tis a Passover of joy,
Therefore banish every sadness;
For, from death to endless life,
Christ our Lord His people bringeth;
As from earth to heaven we rise,
Each his song of triumph singeth.

Triumph of Lofty Madness - Josep Palau i Fabre

I climb on top of myself
and look:
and see myself as more transparent.

Earth The Healer, Earth The Keeper - William Morris

So swift the hours are moving
Unto the time unproved:
Farewell my love unloving,
Farewell my love beloved!

The Bride of a Year - Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

She stands in front of her mirror
    With bright and joyous air,
Smoothes out with a skilful hand
    Her waves of golden hair;
But the tell-tale roses on her cheek,
    So changing yet so bright,
And downcast, earnest eye betray
    New thoughts are hers to-night.

The Cow - Bernard Patrick O'Dowd

This is a rune I ravelled in the still,
Arrogant stare of an Australian cow—

Innocence - Patrick Kavanagh

They laughed at one I loved-
The triangular hill that hung
Under the Big Forth. They said
That I was bounded by the whitethorn hedges
Of the little farm and did not know the world.

The Story of Palm Sunday (as told for the young) - Andrew King

Jerusalem’s past had been quite a blast
when David was monarch and splendid.
But centuries had gone since David passed on,
and God’s blessing seemed to have ended.

An old battle-field - Li Hua

Vast, vast—an endless wilderness of sand;
A stream crawls through its tawny banks; the hills
Encompass it; where in the dismal dusk
Moan the last sighs of sunset. Shrubs are gone,
Withered the grass; all chill as the white rime
Of early morn. The birds go soaring past,

Aurora’s Lovers - Amadou Lamine Sall

I looked for you everywhere and nowhere
between flower and stem
between day and night
among the laughter of slumber
among the caresses of absence

Irmelin - Jens Peter Jacobsen

There lived a king in days departed,
Many treasures rare he owned,
But far beyond the best of these
He thought his beauteous Irmelin,
Irmelin rose,
Irmelin sun,
Irmelin loveliest of all!

Once upon a Time - Giuseppe Ungaretti

Bosco Cappuccio
has a slope

Remember Freedom’s Fields - Martin Kloess

Remember fields where once we used to play
The freedom of our hopes was by our side
Quite strangely they seem different today

Miniature Poetry - Rabbe Enckell

The morning dew has placed small weights
in the dew-cup’s bowl — the scales are even.

Talk To Me - Nnorom Azuonye

Your majesty,
When I consider the endless battle
Of my people for a fair share
Of this star of startling beauty,
I wonder,
What were you thinking
When you made us?

The Otter - Seamus Heaney

When you plunged
The light of Tuscany wavered
And swung through the pool
From top to bottom.

The Spanish Needle - Claude McKay

Lovely dainty Spanish needle
With your yellow flower and white,
Dew bedecked and softly sleeping,
Do you think of me to-night?

The Peasant Declares His Love - Émile Roumer

High-yellow of my heart, with breasts like tangerines,
you taste better to me than eggplant stuffed with crab,

The Hanging Judge - A G Stephens

I am the Judge, the flower of the law,
Bolstered in, privileged, all men’s awe;
When I am pleased to display my wit
The court is a-cackle with joy of it;
When my liver is slightly out of order
Woe to who crosses me—barrister, warder!

Cologne - Paul Celan

In Kohln, a town of monks and bones,
And pavements fang'd with murderous stones

How to Die in Zapotec - Dalthon Pineda

I
The white bird traverses the nocturne sky,
a parrot of dark omens,

                        someone predicts your death and leads herself
                        to your house to embalm it with misery.

Dust - Olufunke Kolapo

Clay and water
Sieved and pounded
Moulded and shaped of His hands

You are the seed - Karin Boye

You are the seed and I your soil.
You lie in me and grow.
You are the child expected.
I am your mother now.

Spring harbingers - George Cosbuc

From sunny countries and skies of blue
From which last autumn-tide you flew,
Return, dear birds, where you belong,
Most welcome here are you!
The woods, bereft of leaf and song,
Weep for for missingt you so long.

A Spring Song, An Otomi Song, A Plain Song - Nahuatl indian (anonymous)

I, the singer, have entered many flower gardens,
places of pleasance, favoured spots,
where the dew spread out its glittering surface,
where sang various lovely birds,  where the coyol birds^[1] let fall their song,
and spreading far around, their voices rejoiced the Cause of All,
He who is God, ohuaya! ohuaya!^[2]

The advent of Siva (The Hunter and the Hero - Book IX) - Bhāravi

By Indra's mandate Arjun great
   Once more began his pious rites,
And worship paid to saintly Siva
   Dwelling in far Kailâsa's heights.

Adolescence - P.K. Page

In love they wore themselves in a green embrace.
A silken rain fell through the spring upon them.
In the park she fed the swans and he
whittled nervously with his strange hands.
And white was mixed with all their colours
as if they drew it from the flowering trees.

This Love - Jacques Prévert

This love
So violent
So fragile
So tender
So hopeless

There Is a House in Heaven - Spervogel

There is a house in heaven, they say;
You reach it by a golden way.

New Year's Watch - Su Shi

Soon now, we'll mark the year's end that approaches,
It's like a snake that crawls into a hole.

Lullaby - Fenny Sterenborg

Softly lie down
and close your eyes so blue
worry no more
for tonight I'll watch over you

Watermark - Fatima Naoot

They will ring the bells the first of June
Some good reasons for that
The most important one is that
It is the first of June

Moonshine - Kate Jennings

Yesterday I was sick, sick
in the head,
panic and paranoia,
it's been like that for years, used to say
I was a victim or the victim.

Inkerman: The Battle Field by Moonlight - Caroline Hayward

Above the vale of Inkerman,
Calmly the moon's rays fell,
Revealing as by light of day,
That deep and lonely dell;
Tchernaya's waters as a band
Of silver graceful flowed,
But who can paint the ghastly scene,
Which those bright rays disclosed!

The Fight With The Dragon - Friedrich Von Schiller

Why run the crowd?  What means the throng
That rushes fast the streets along?
Can Rhodes a prey to flames, then, be?
In crowds they gather hastily,
And, on his steed, a noble knight
Amid the rabble, meets my sight;

Love, Love - Pedro Calderón de la Barca

What is the glory far above
All else in human life?
Love! Love!

Mirroring - Alessio Zanelli

We are all the others.

Each of us.

All we are or attain in life
is also due to all the others.

Hope - Juan Esteban Yupanqui Villalobos

So I want to see you again
even in my sleep.
You have to know: now again
I grieve for you a lot.

A Day in Bed - Katherine Mansfield

I wish I had not got a cold,
The wind is big and wild,
I wish that I was very old,
Not just a little child.

Odd - Philippe Soupault

A thread tightens
a shadow descends
a butterfly distends

Forgiveness - George William Russell

At dusk the window panes grew grey;
The wet world vanished in the gloom;
The dim and silver end of day
Scarce glimmered through the little room.

The Prayer of the Cockerel - Carmen Bernos de Gasztold

Do not forget, Lord,
it is l who make the sun rise.

My Time Is Brief - Solveig von Schoultz

The holy disquiet knocked at my door.
‘I haven’t the time, I’m baking my bread,
the dough is rising, the oven is red.
Wait, as you’ve had to wait before.’

De Spectaculis.III (What race is set so far) - Marcus Valerius Martialis

What race is set so far,
what race so barbarous, Caesar,
wherefrom a spectator is not in thy city?

Border Song IV - Lu Lun

A sumptuous banquet is spread, in the wild, the open air:
Our tribal allies have come, our hard-won victory to share.

Before the sun comes up - Katlego K Kol-Kes

Before the sun comes up:
When the eyes of those
who creep around in day, alight,
yet dance with tender
taps and bats.

Make me teach me - Mirjam Tuominen

Make me pure
teach me silence
make me whole

The Trunk of the Olive Tree (The Odyssey, Book XXIII) - Homer

An old trunk of olive
grew like a pillar on the building plot,

A Visit to the Clockmaker - Kristin Dimitrova

I crossed the street
to enter a secret shop
where hundreds of hands grind time.

Bless You - Drora Matlofsky

She sneezed, then muttered 'Thank you'

Amnesia - Ilire Zajmi

My memory has been erased
It is not stored either in a hard copy
Nor in a disk a flash or a CD

On Prose - Kiwao Nomura

Then I
committed to memory everything
I felt compelled to remember

One life - Inua Ellams

In a farm in Mexico, a grain of corn
is armed with faith. Half covered with soil
it trusts the wind will guide it water, waits
as sunlight plaits itself into photosynthesis,
germinates and listens for the world’s pay.

A Poem - Kapardeli Eftichia

Snow... the last
white flakes
fall on the earth

The Grave of Shelley - Oscar Wilde

Like burnt-out torches by a sick man's bed
    Gaunt cypress-trees stand round the sun bleached stone;
    Here doth the little night-owl make her throne,

February - Margaret Atwood

Winter. Time to eat fat
and watch hockey. In the pewter mornings, the cat,
a black fur sausage with yellow
Houdini eyes, jumps up on the bed and tries
to get onto my head. It’s his
way of telling whether or not I’m dead.

One Friend - Paramahansa Yogananda

Many clouds do race to hide Thee –

Beasties - Helen Cruickshank

Clock-leddy, clock-leddy
    Flee awa' hame,
Your lum's in a lowe,
    Your bairns in a flame;

Birdish - Astrid Cabral

Among some green or dried out leaves
there sings upon the window sill
a foreign bird.

The Silver Maids - Carl Spitteler

High in their belfry swinging,
The Silver Maids are singing
Their matin-psalm of praise and cheer;
No angel tones diviner,
The farther off, the finer,
Nor even fails one practiced ear.

That wren - Kobayashi Issa

That wren—

Always for the first time - Andre Breton

Always for the first time
Hardly do I know you by sight
You return at some hour of the night to a house at an angle to my window
A wholly imaginary house

Gerontophobia - Marilyn Duckworth

I go to bed considering insulin
How much to flood the vein that is me
So that I may turn over in my grave
Composed, dead level?
But wake daily, measuring the panic dream, collecting
My thoughts. Am I still threaded?

Vondel's Lucifer (Act I, lines 344-410) - Joost van den Vondel

Chorus of Angels:
Strophe.
Who is it on His Throne, high-seated,
So deep in boundless realms of light,
Whose measure, space nor time hath meted,
Nor e'en eternity; whose might,
Supportless, yet itself maintaineth,
Floating on pinions of repose;

Recreation - Audre Lorde

Coming together
it is easier to work
after our bodies
meet

Easy - Sampurna Chattarji

Death is easy to pronounce.
He deserved to die.
They ought to be shot.
Hanging’s too good for him.
The words fall glib.
Throwaway lines
sentencing them to death.

I was standing - Anna Kamienska

I was standing with my sister over the patch of grave
And we were speaking about some very important things.
The boy is doing better at school. The youngest already chatters.
If you aren’t mean to people, they’ll be good to you.

Clarification to My Poetry-Readers - Nizar Qabbani

And of me say the fools:
I entered the lodges of women
And never left.
And they call for my hanging,
Because about the matters of my beloved
I, poetry, compose.

A Ballad That We Do Not Perish - Zbigniew Herbert

Those who sailed at dawn
but will never return
left their trace on a wave—

To the Tune of Qing and Ping, I of Three (Verses for the Lady Yang) - Li Bai

In clouds, I think of her raiment, in flowers, see her face,

Accept It - Solveig von Schoultz

Accept it, God.
I give you my defeat.

Remember man - Anonymous

Remember man
As thou goest by,

The Water Butt - Solveig von Schoultz

The water butt by the corner
has an eye that I love.

Sun is in the East! - Leng Mei

Sun is in the East!
This lovely man
Is in my house,

Breakfast - Jacques Prévert

He poured the coffee
Into the cup
He put the milk
Into the cup of coffee
He put the sugar
Into the coffee with milk
With a small spoon

Eight Line Poem - David Bowie

The tactful cactus by your window
Surveys the prairie of your room

Song of the Full Catch - Constance Lindsay Skinner

Here's good wind, here's sweet wind,
Here's good wind and my woman calls me!

God Has Pity On Kindergarten Children - Yehuda Amichai

God has pity on kindergarten children,
He pities school children -- less.
But adults he pities not at all.

He Was Called - Giuseppe Ungaretti

He was called
Moammed Sceab
descended
from emirs from nomads

The Stars Stand Up In The Air - Thomas MacDonagh

The stars up in the air,
The sun and the moon are gone,
The strand of its waters is bare.
And her sway is swept from the swan.

Hédauville - Roland Leighton

The sunshine on the long white road
That ribboned down the hill,
The velvet clematis that clung
Around your window-sill
Are waiting for you still.

Poems from The Tale of Genji (chapter 49) - Murasaki Shikibu

"When I went too pluck for our august Sovereign's hair wisteria blossoms,
       ah, how far above my head was the branch that caught my sleeves"

Book Two Elegy 15 - Sextus Propertius

O happy me! O night of radiance, and you,
   sweet bed that's strewn with such delights!
What declarations when the lamp was lit, what fights
   and tussles when the light was doused!
With breasts undone she teased me as we wrestled: then,
   with clothes drawn up, she feigned delay.
Her breath fell on my eyelids thick with sleep: she hissed,
   'Is this the way you finish, sluggard?'
Such length of arms' embraces as we changed positions,
   kisses lengthening on the lips!

When Mother Calls to Dinner - Uloola

We're on a farm not far from town—
There's just a dozen acres;
Our neighbours range from atheists
And infidels to Quakers;
We've got the good old pious sort
‘Long-side the hardened sinner—
But that won't spoil our appetite
When Mother calls to dinner.

Kinder Than Miriam - Kajal Ahmad

Our nation is as lonely
as Father Adam was
before the fertile
arrival of Mother Eve.

The Wind on the Hills - Dora Sigerson Shorter

Go not to the hills of Erinn
When the night winds are about,
Put up your bar and shutter,
And so keep danger out.

New Year - Bei Dao

a child carrying flowers walks toward the new year
a conductor tattooing darkness
listens to the shortest pause