Song of the Universal Come said the Muse, Sing me a song no poet has chanted, Sing me the universal. In this broad earth of ours, Amid the measureless grossness and the slag, Enclosed and safe within its central heart, Nestles the seed perfection. By every life a share or more or less, None born…
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The Journey One day you finally knew what you had to do, and began, though the voices around you kept shouting their bad advice— though the whole house began to tremble and you felt the old tug at your ankles. “Mend my life!” each voice cried. But you didn’t stop. You knew what you had…
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After crossing fifty I have come to realize… Dreams are What we live every day And not something that we will achieve someday in the future. There is no timeline for happiness, It surprises you when you’re expecting it the least Same is true for success. Love, I no longer chase you I feel your…
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When Death Comes When death comes like the hungry bear in autumn; when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse to buy me, and snaps the purse shut; when death comes like the measle-pox; when death comes like an iceberg between the shoulder blades, I want to step through the door…
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Do Not Stand At My Grave And Weep Do Not Stand At My Grave And Weep I am Not there. I do not sleep. I am a thousands winds that blow. I am the diamond glints on snow. I am the sunlight on ripened grain. I am the gentle autumn rain. When you awaken in…
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keeping a day ahead when space occupied by those preceding still reeks of waste is deemed vagrancy and planning non-events because your life depends on it does not explain why no demand exists in any case living in expectancy of a life-changing phone-call doesn’t bring order to the chaos surrounding you, so unleash suspense, be…
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Woodcutter. Cut out my shadow. Free me from the torture of seeing myself fruitless. Why was I born among mirrors? The daylight revolves around me. And the night herself repeats me in all her constellations. I want to live not seeing self. I shall dream the husks and insects change inside my dreaming into my…
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The Idler An idle lingerer on the wayside’s road, He gathers up his work and yawns away; A little longer, ere the tiresome load Shall be reduced to ashes or to clay. No matter if the world has marched along, And scorned his slowness as it quickly passed; No matter, if amid the busy throng,…
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A Man In His Life A man doesn’t have time in his life to have time for everything. He doesn’t have seasons enough to have a season for every purpose. Ecclesiastes Was wrong about that. A man needs to love and to hate at the same moment, to laugh and cry with the same eyes,…
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Open the window, and let the air Freshly blow upon face and hair, And fill the room, as it fills the night, With the breath of the rain’s sweet might. Hark! the burthen, swift and prone! And how the odorous limes are blown! Stormy Love’s abroad, and keeps Hopeful coil for gentle sleeps. Not a…
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Tools for life Has life ever dumped you in a heap? Perhaps you’ve found self belief so strongly reinforcing that doubt never enters it, nor divorces you from your own reality. While I admire conviction I see it an affliction of the blessed, sign of the righteously possessed and indeed, a decent place to serve…
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‘Green Rain’ I remember long veils of green rain Feathered like the shawl of my grandmother – Green from the half-green of the spring trees Waving in the valley. I remember the road Like the one which leads to my grandmother’s house, A warm house, with green carpets, Geraniums, a trilling canary And shining horse-hair…
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I am a child and free I have no place or dwelling how vast the sky is when the whole world is a poem it’s broad daylight on earth night has not yet been created I have a foothold in all of time – Amina Saïd j’eus dix ans le ciel en têtej’empruntai ses ailes…
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Those Bells Are Driving Me Crazy Those bells are driving me crazy How can I sleep? Ten times a day I pine for him I’ll wear the chains of his love Till death Standing at the edge They cry out, ‘My love!’ But they love only their lives Some claim, ‘I’m all yours’ But wet…
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FOR THE NEW YEAR Stamped in the throat bird song biologists say is inevitable as that beak that eye that red wing is not learned is born with the bird. Perhaps then there’s another dimension behind our learned word patterns … perhaps an infinite song sways in our throats yet to be heard? .. ……
Read MoreINSOMNIA The province of my Insomnia Is like the expanse of An arid river Quite often I come here barefooted Accepting its call I walk through And collide with The brambles of Old dreams And unsolved truths The entire stretch is Full of prolific roots Impossible to Pull out And the sun, the moon and…
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O, Were I Loved As I Desire To Be! O, were I loved as I desire to be! What is there in the great sphere of the earth, Or range of evil between death and birth, That I should fear, – if I were loved by thee! All the inner, all the outer world of…
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I stumbled across a grain of truth, In the suns last drops of light, As I stood out in my garden, And watched the fruit bats daily flight, They moved as though united, Their flapping wings a silent dance, And as they flew above me, I stood frozen in a trance, Their flight conveyed such…
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Dunya Mikhail was born in Iraq (Baghdad) in 1965 and came to the United States thirty years later. She’s renowned for her subversive, innovative, and satirical poetry. After graduation from the University of Baghdad, she worked as a journalist and translator for the Baghdad Observer. Facing censorship and interrogation, she left Iraq, first to Jordan…
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बग़दाद के अपने बग़ीचे में मैं अक्सर भागा करता था उसके पीछे मगर वह उड़कर दूर चली जाती थी हमेश। आज तीन दशकों बाद एक दूसरे महाद्वीप में वह आकर बैठ गई मेरे कन्धे पर। नीली समन्दर के ख़यालों या आख़िरी साँसें लेती किसी परी के आँसुओं की तर॥ उसके पर स्वर्ग से गिरती दो…
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