old white men
turn blind eyes
deaf ears
to the shrill cries
of women
of children
so much unlike
themselves
Month: February 2024
February 2, 1968 by Wendell Berry
In the dark of the moon, in flying snow, in the dead of winter,
war spreading, families dying, the world in danger,
I walk the rocky hillside, sowing clover.
just like Magellan
the proof they say
is in the pudding
the deed done
the task fulfilled
planned just like Magellan
the claws out
the teeth glisten
all hands on deck
sailing savagely on
toward tomorrow
and the cruel joke
good deed upended
to die cut down
on some alien shore
close but not quite home
poem by Ise Tayü
The farmer’s clothes are soaked through and never dried,
in the long May rains
that fall without cease,
from a sky with never a rift in the clouds.
translated by Kenneth Rexroth & Ikuko Atsumi
poem by Ono no Komachi
Without changing color
in the emptiness
of this world of ours,
the heart of man
fades like a flower.
translated by Kennerth Rexroth & Ikuko Atsumi
Style by Paul Blackburn
I do not know what is
the price, how
the hair falls down
past the ears
over the shoulders, it is
a style of living.
Old Question (for Fee) by Paul Blackburn
Why has life put such
a need to talk inside us,
when there is nobody to talk to?
A Sketch from 1844 by Tomas Tranströmer
William Turner’s face is weather-brown
he has set up his easel far out among the breakers.
We follow the silver-green cable down in the depths.
He wades out in the shelving kingdom of death.
A train rolls in. Come closer.
Rain, rain travels over us.
translated by Robin Fulton
Late May by Tomas Tranströmer
Apple trees and cherry trees in bloom help the town to soar
in the sweet dirty May night, white life-jacket, my thoughts range out.
Grasses and weeds with silent stubborn wing-beats.
The letter-box shines calmly, what’s written can’t be taken back.
Soft cool wind gets through my shirt and gropes for my heart.
Apple trees and cherry trees, they laugh silently at Solomon
they blossom in my tunnel. I need them
not to forget but to remember.
translated by Robin Fulton
The Two Pagodas of Orchid Stream by Yang Wan-li
The tall pagoda is not pointed, the short one is.
One of them wears an embroidered robe,
the other a silver shirt.
Do you wonder why they never say a word?
It’s because the rapids speak for them
with the voice of Buddha.
translated by Jonathan Chaves
Leonard Durso 