Weeds

In gardens, it's the unwanted 
babies that grow best and biggest, 
swarming our beds of frail 
legitimate darlings with roots    
like wire and crude, bright flower-heads. 

They seem oblivious to the fury of steel prongs
earthquaking around them. 
If they fall today, tomorrow
they'll stand all the greener. 

Too soon, the beautiful lives    
we've trembled over with sprays 
of pesticide, friendly stakes, 
and watering-cans at sunset, 
give in, leaving us helpless. 

The weeds, the unfavoured ones, 
stare at us hungrily, 
and since it is hard to live    
empty of love, we try 
to smile; we learn to forgive them.

by Carol Rumens

Sea Song

You look different every time you come
from the foam-crested brine
It's your skin shining softly in the moonlight
Partly fish, parly porpoise, partly baby sperm whale
Am I yours? Are you mine to play with?
Joking apart when you're drunk
You're terrific when you're drunk
I like you mostly late at night - you're quite all right 

But I can't understand the different you
In the morning when it's time to play
at being human for a while
Please smile!

You'll be different in the spring, I know
You're a seasonal beast
Like the starfish that drifted with the tide, with the tide
So until your blood runs to meet the next full moon
Your madness fits in nicely with my own, with my own
Your lunacy fits neatly with my own - my very own

We're not alone...

Robert Wyatt

The Wind Throws Back

I lied when I told you I didn't have 
a phone number, she said. I wasn't
sure about you, but now that I know
you're sane & responsible—aren't you?— 
I'm going to throw caution to the wind 
& hope it doesn't blow back in my face.  
But if you ever spent any time in a mental hospital 
I'd like to know. I won't let 
it prejudice me against you. 
I'm willing to give you a chance, 
provided you get a letter from a psychiatrist 
stating your case was closed.

by Hal Sirowitz

Believing in Fate

I don't have a telephone, she said, 
so I can't give you a number. 
I'm not a great fan of planned dates. 
But if I happen to bump into you
on the street I'd be willing to go for coffee. 
Let's leave it to chance. It brought
us together once. It could work a second time. 
You could help fate along by hanging out
in Chelsea. That's where I live. If I
gave you any more information I'd be cheating. 

by Hal Sirowitz

Late

Had I met you when I was a girl, all bony laughter and ragged sighs,
I would have fallen under your shadow, knelt in the grass, been your weed, your bride.
And had I met you when I was another man's wife—still young, hair full of flame—
I'd have taken the spell for a sign. I'd have been jewel to your thief, little sin, and never
forgiven myself for that kiss. Or had I met you in the early wind of my solitude, I might
have snapped. Cracked like that naked branch I swung from all those aching, brilliant nights.
Instead, you came late, you came after I'd made myself into harbor and chalice and wick.
More like the ashes than any warm hearth. More like a widow than wanton, beloved.
And you lifted me over the wall of the garden and carried me back to my life.


by Cecilia Woloch

Failing and Flying

Everyone forgets that Icarus also flew.
It's the same when love comes to an end,
or the marriage fails and people say
they knew it was a mistake, that everybody
said it would never work. That she was 
old enough to know better. But anything
worth doing is worth doing badly.
Like being there by that summer ocean
on the other side of the island while
love was fading out of her, the stars
burning so extravagantly those nights that 
anyone could tell you they would never last.
Every morning she was asleep in my bed
like a visitation, the gentleness in her
like antelope standing in the dawn mist.
Each afternoon I watched her coming back 
through the hot stony field after swimming,
the sea light behind her and the huge sky 
on the other side of that. Listened to her
while we ate lunch. How can they say
the marriage failed? Like the people who 
came back from Provence (when it was Provence)
and said it was pretty but the food was greasy. 
I believe Icarus was not failing as he fell, 
but just coming to the end of triumph.

by Jack Gilbert

the invention of mathematics: two

after the number two there was no stopping
troubles blossoming
in geometric progression
two to tango
and two required for murder and war
Doris Day singing
love me or leave me
and the tragic lob
of my nervous girlheart
th-thump, th-thump
she already knew
that deafening silence
when the call goes unanswered
th-thump, th-thump
with its inevitable
downbeat on two

by Amy Uyematsu

Siempre (Always)

Antes de ti

no tengo celos.

Ven con un hombre

a la espalda,

ven con cien hombres en tu cabellera,

ven con mil hombres entre tu pecho y tus pies,

ven como un rio

lleno de ahogados

que encuentra el mar furioso,

la espuma eterna, el tiempo.

Traelos todos

adonde yo te espero:

siempre estaremos solos,

siempre estaremos tu y yo

solos sobre la tierra

para comenzar la vida.

by Pablo Neruda

In English...

Always

Facing you

I am not jealous.

Come with a man

at your back,

come with a hundred men in your long hair,

come with a thousand men between your chest and your feet,

come like a river

filled with drowned men

that meets the furious sea,

the eternal foam, time.

Bring them all

to where I wait for you:

we shall always be alone,

it shall always be you and me

alone upon the earth

to begin life.