Humanities 1 Readings: POEMS

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HUMANITIES 1 [POETRY]

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Poetic AppearancesCecil Rajendra

And shall I ruffle my hair

slip into a poetic trance

and mutter aloud to myself?

Or shall I feign absent-

mindedness & sit down on my beer? 5

And shall I walk about town

with a dog-eared copy of Chairil

Anwar in my hip-pocket?

Or shall I give up soccer

Crook my little finger 10

And act vaguely effeminate?

And shall I do my reading

in a Dashiki with a sling-

bag draped around my shoulder?

Or shall I read into a paper bag 15

with a python curled on my lap?

Shall I be weird, eccentric

talk with a limp, walk in a stutter

and when someone asks me

the name of the Prime Minister 20

shall I, shall I answer D.J. Dave?

And is it absolutely necessary

to father illegitimate children?

Contract syphilis, smoke opium

and commit suicide before 25

out of some iambic obligation?

To write a true poem

Is no difficult operation

you simply walk through fire.

To pass off as a poet30

is a more complicated matterthere are so many expectations.


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2

Morning SongSylvia Plath(1932-1963)

Love set you going like a fat gold watch. 1

The midwife slapped your footsoles, and your bald cry

Took its place among the elements.

Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue.

In a drafty museum, your nakedness 5

Shadows our safety. We stand round blankly as walls.

I'm no more your mother

Than the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slow

Effacement at the wind's hand.

All night your moth-breath 10

Flickers among the flat pink roses. I wake to listen:

A far sea moves in my ear.

One cry, and I stumble from bed, cow-heavy and floral

In my Victorian nightgown.

Your mouth opens clean as a cat's. The window square 15

Whitens and swallows its dull stars. And now you try

Your handful of notes;

The clear vowels rise like balloons.


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Alone and Drinking Under the Moon

Li Po/Bai(701-762)

Amongst the flowers I 1am alone with my pot of wine

drinking by myself; then liftingmy cup I asked the moon

to drink with me, its reflectionand mine in the wine cup, just 5

the three of us; then I sighfor the moon cannot drink,

and my shadow goes emptily alongwith me never saying a word;

with no other friends here, I can 10but use these two for company;

in the time of happiness, Itoo must be happy with allaround me; I sit and singand it is as if the moon 15

accompanies me; then if I

dance, it is my shadow thatdances along with me; while

still not drunk, I am gladto make the moon and my shadow 20

into friends, but then whenI have drunk too much, we

all part; yet these are

friends I can always count onthese who have no emotion 25

whatsoever; I hope that one daywe three will meet again,deep in the Milky Way.


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5

The Guerilla Is Like a Poet

Jose Maria Sison

The guerilla is like a poetKeen to the rustle of leaves

The break of twigs

The ripples of the river

The smell of fire

And the ashes of departure.

The guerilla is like a poet.

He has merged with the trees

The bushes and the rocksAmbiguous but precise

Well-versed on the law of motion

And the master of myriad images.

The guerilla is like a poet

Enrhymed with nature

The subtle rhythm of the greenery

The inner silence, the outer innocence

The steel tensile in-graceThat ensnares the enemy.

The guerilla is like a poet.

He moves with the green brown multitude

In bush burning with red flowers

That crown and hearten all

Swarming the terrain as a flood

Marching at last against the stronghold.

An endless movement of strength

Behold the protracted theme:

The people's epic, the people's war.


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The Red Wheelbarrow

William Carlos Williams

so much depends

upon

a red wheel

barrow

glazed with rain

water

beside the white

chickens.

IN A STATION OF THE METRO

The apparition of these faces in the crowd:

Petals on a wet, black bough.

(Ezra Pound, 1885-1972)

Fame is a beeEmily DickinsonFame is a bee.

It has a song --

It has a sting --

Ah, too, it has a wing.

Faith is a fine invention

Faith is a fine invention

By which Gentlemen can see --

ButMicroscopes are prudent

In an Emergency.


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7

72. "Death be not proud, though some have called thee"

John Donne (1572-1631)

DEATH be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,

For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow,

Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.

From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,

5

Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,

And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,

Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.

Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,

And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell,10

And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,

And better then thy stroake; why swell'st thou then;

One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,

And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.


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FromOmar Khayyams The Rubaiyat*

.

*Omar Khayyam, The Rubayiyat, trans. Peter Avery and John Heath-Stubbs

(London: Penguin Books, 1981), 37-38.


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Ode to Salt

Pablo Neruda

This salt

in the salt cellarI once saw in the salt mines.

I know

you won't5

believe me

but

it sings

salt sings, the skin

of the salt mines 10

sings

with a mouth smothered

by the earth.I shivered in those

solitudes 15

when I heard

the voice

of

the salt

in the desert. 20

Near Antofagasta

the nitrous

pampa

resounds:

a 25

broken

voice,

a mournful

song.

In its caves 30

the salt moans, mountain

of buried light,

translucent cathedral,

crystal of the sea, oblivion

of the waves. 35

And then on every table

in the world,

salt,

we see your piquantpowder 40

sprinkling

vital light

upon

our food.

Preserver 45

of the ancient

holds of ships,

discoverer

on

the high seas, 50

earliest

sailor

of the unknown, shifting

byways of the foam.

Dust of the sea, in you 55

the tongue receives a kiss

from ocean night:

taste imparts to every seasoned

dish your ocean essence;

the smallest, 60

miniature

wave from the saltcellar

reveals to us

more than domestic whiteness;

in it, we taste finitude 65

Humanities 1 Readings: POEMS

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