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The Poetry Corner

Welcome to the poetry corner. If you are tired of endlessly pilgriming, surfing, riding, or just walking the Web, you can catch your breath here. Take off your shoes. Relax. Get a cup of coffee or a glass of lemonade. Here you will find some of the poems I enjoy, written by well-established authors and by less-known amateur ones. Poems for which copyrights haven't expired are presented here with the author's permission.

Somewhere I Have Never Traveled

somewhere i have never traveled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skillfully,mysteriously)her first rose

or if your wish be to close me,i and
my life will shut very beautifully,suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility: whose texture
compels me with the colour of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain, has such small hands

— E.E.Cummings

Velvet

sunlight nudging away sleep
nothing to do nowhere to go
just lazily drifting between
dreams cool silk sheets
and jade-sky morning

— Z. M. Evensen

Silentium

Speak not, lie hidden, and conceal
the way you dream, the things you feel.
Deep in your spirit let them rise
akin to stars in crystal skies
that set before the night is blurred:
delight in them and speak no word.

How can a heart expression find?
How should another know your mind?
Will he discern what quickens you?
A thought once uttered is untrue.
Dimmed is the fountainhead when stirred:
drink at the source and speak no word.

Live in your inner self alone
within your soul a world has grown,
the magic of veiled thoughts that might
be blinded by the outer light,
drowned in the noise of day, unheard...
take in their song and speak no word.

— Fyodor Tyutchev (translated by Vladimir Nabokov)

A Day of Flowers

Today is a day of flowers, a day of green shining in the sun, a day of celebration. Or is it? A few moments ago I was sad. Now it is a celebration. The sun was out then, as it is now. What is the difference in situations? I do not know, but the difference remains.

Perhaps it is a question of position—I was lying down then; I am sitting up now. It may indeed be a question of position. Or may not be. It may be a question of attention--I am attending to images now, perhaps my previous sadness was a signal of neglect, a complaint from within, from some inner yearning which wanted recognition from consciousness. Perhaps it was that. I favor this explanation for a number of reasons, recounting which is not important enough for the requisite effort. If you wish further investigation, you may do it yourself.

It could also be that things simply change by themselves, and I am one of these things. Changing. Momentarily. Instantaneously. Suddenly. He says this is so. A friend of mine. A person with whom I meet and speak. He says things are changing, I among them. I cannot deny it. It does not seem an observation open to contradiction by me or anyone else. And so I nod my head as he says it. Often. And my head nods by itself. Something of me agreeing vigorously. As we sit there and change. Now walking.

— Ralph Cherubini

Listen!

Listen!
If stars get kindled,
Then—someone needs that?
Then someone wants them to be there?
Then someone treasures these spittles as diamonds?

And, perishing
in the afternoon heat,
he's pleading to God;
frightened that it is too late,
crying,
kisses His rugged hand,
begs
that there be a star!—
vows—
he wouldn't survive the starless torture!
And after, he wanders restlessly,
but looking unruffled,
telling someone,
"You're all right now?
Not scared?
Right?!"
Listen,
if stars
get kindled,
then someone needs that?
Then it is essential that
every evening
there is at least one star
above our homes?!

— V. Mayakovsky (translated by Lenny Zeltser)

The Hat

Today I saw a hat
lying on the pavement
with a note attached
that read

An invisible man
stands before you,
imagine my plight
and be generous
It was raining
and feeling sorry for him
I added a coin
to the pile in his hat

while in a shop doorway
across the street
a man with no hat
looked quickly away.

— J. Brookes (Cardiff, Wales, UK)

Yogurt and Me and the Dog

I like Yosemite National Park. You like?
Sometimes I see the park in a dream.
I've never been there, but I have a picture postcard
of the park. It's on the curtain rail of my room.

I work hard from Monday to Friday.
My workplace is far away from Yosemite National Park,
because my office is in Japan.
Human relations of my workplace isn't so good.
But the dog smiles silently and says,
"It's not so important."

I always buy something to eat for my supper
on my way home from my workplace.
Almost every day, I buy yogurt.
Strangely enough, to eat it makes me fine.
The dog also likes yogurt and he knows the reason
why to eat it makes me fine.
The dog smiles silently and says,
"Yogurt's justification for existance is
to console people in his sorrow."

In weekday mornigns,
to go to work on the subway is a hard thing.
I am at work one hour before the start of office hours,
because the trains of early hours are not so crowded.
When I get to my office every mornign, the first thing
to do is reading the newspaper bought at the stasion.
I can get to know many happenings by the newspaper,
and can get to know that to live in the world is so hard.
My office is a far cry from Yosemite National Park.
The dog smiles silently and says, "It's not so important."

— Yoshihiko Nakata

Here

On some mornings
you will suddenly wake up,
dreaming that you have heard
her voice calling you
from outside the door.
The sweet sound of your name on
her lips will be enticing
in your delirium,
you will want to throw
open the door and find her,
but she will not be there;
recognize the wind for what it is.
Some day
you will be walking down the street
and two blocks ahead
you will see the blue
of her favorite sweater.
Resist the urge to run
for her embrace;
you will not find her arms.
Sometimes
it will be her bounce
for just a moment,
in the body of another woman,
or the curve of her neck—
but these are illusions,
intangible wishes; discard them.
When walking through a mall
sometime
you will smell her hair
brush by you,
sense her body right beside you—
keep walking, but breathe deep.
One night
when you are shifting
under your sheets,
you might confuse
the caress of silk
along your side
for the tingle of her fingertips
touching you—
stay still.
Maybe that same night
she will lay herself gently
on your tongue and dissolve,
trickling down your throat.
When you taste her in the air,
then turn around.

— Shawn Lynn Walker

The Way You Feel

When trees undrape, and you don't care;
When your friends leave, but you don't notice;
When sleepless morning lasts forever,
And then the day begins its torture;
When scent of hope is in the air,
But you're too weak to recognize it,
And simple words are too revealing,
And melodies are not harmonic,
Then only she can make you better,
And only silence will express
The way you feel.

— Lenny Zeltser

We Walked Together

We walked together, yet somehow
Your eyes avoided my direction,
And in the breeze of summer day
We had a mindless conversation.

White clouds calmly strolled across
The silk apparel of the gardens.
Serene and pallid was your cheek,
And eyes were glittering like flowers.

I feared reaching with my gaze
The warmth of your half-opened lips.
Yet, we were blissfully untamed
By the perplexing world in which we lived.

— Ivan Bunin (translated by Lenny Zeltser)