Swan Song of the Thief an adaptation of Bilhana’s Caurapâñcâśikâ by Dawn Corrigan 1. Still I remember her, the white magnolia of her body, the line of hair down her belly a stamen trembling beneath my hand. I’ve lost that body like a forgotten science. 2. Still I see her light increased by love— below the stars and moon, with face aglow, her body burned as though it might catch fire until I cooled her limbs and she could sleep. 3. And still if she would come to me again with love-smeared eyes and breasts that bent thin shoulders with their weight, I’d drink her mouth— the bee, that connoisseur of nature, at a bud. 4. Still I bring her back, wearied so with love she couldn’t lift her body from the bed, black hair against her cheeks, her guilty arms wound round my neck and left their scent on me. 5. Still I remember glittering eyes that d...
You and Me and P.B. Shelley What is life? Life is stepping down a step or sitting in a chair. And it isn't there. Life is not having been told that the man has just waxed the floor. Life is pulling doors marked PUSH and pushing doors marked PULL and not noticing notices which say PLEASE USE OTHER DOOR. It is when you diagnose a sore throat as an unprepared geography lesson and send your child weeping to school only to be returned an hour later covered with spots that are indubitable genuine. Life is a concert with a trombone soloist filling in for Yehudi Menuhin. But, were it not for frustration and humiliation I suppose the human race would get ideas above its station. Somebody once described Shelley as a beautiful and ineffective angel beating his luminous wings against the void in vain. Which is certainly describing with might and main. But probably means that we are all brothers under our pelts. And that Shelley went around pulling doors marked PUSH and pushing doors marked PUL...
Dream Deferred by Langston Hughes What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up Like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore-- And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over-- like a syrupy sweet? Maybe it just sags like a heavy load. Or does it explode?