Words That Burn

Yorkshiremen in Pub Gardens, by Gavin Ewart (1916-1995)

As they sit there, happily drinking,
their strokes, cancers and so forth are not in their minds.
Indeed, what earthly good would thinking
about the future (which is Death) do? Each summer finds
beer in their hands in big pint glasses.
And so their leisure passes.

Perhaps the older ones allow some inkling
into their thoughts. Being hauled, as a kid, upstairs to bed
screaming for a teddy or a tinkling
musical box, against their will. Each Joe or Fred
wants longer with the life and lasses.
And so their time passes.

Second childhood, and ‘Come in, number eighty!’
shouts inexorably the man in charge of the boating pool.
When you’re called you must go, matey,
so don’t complain, keep it all calm and cool,
there’s masses of time yet, masses, masses…
And so their life passes.

The Skylark, by John Clare(1793-1864)

by Izumi Shikibu, (c. 976-????)

The Apparition, by John Donne (1572-1631)

When by thy scorn, O murd’ress, I am dead,
And that thou thinkst thee free
From all solicitation from me,
Then shall my ghost come to thy bed,
And thee, feign’d vestal, in worse arms shall see :
Then thy sick taper will begin to wink,
And he, whose thou art then, being tired before,
Will, if thou stir, or pinch to wake him, think
Thou call’st for more,
And, in false sleep, will from thee shrink :
And then, poor aspen wretch, neglected thou
Bathed in a cold quicksilver sweat wilt lie,
A verier ghost than I.
What I will say, I will not tell thee now,
Lest that preserve thee ; and since my love is spent,
I’d rather thou shouldst painfully repent,
Than by my threatenings rest still innocent.

NOTES:

Line 3 — Solicitation means pleading.

Line 5 — Vestal means virgin.

Line 6 — A taper is a candle.

Line 11 — Aspens are tall pale trees, also known as poplars, so the “murd’ress” addressed in the poem is pale with fear.

Line 12 — Quicksilver is another word for mercury.

Line 13 — Verier means truer, more truly.

In a Prominent Bar in Secaucus One Day, by X. J. Kennedy (1929-)

In a prominent bar in Secaucus one day
Rose a lady in skunk with a topheavy sway,
Raised a knobby red finger–all turned from their beer–
While with eyes bright as snowcrust she sang high and clear:

‘Now who of you’d think from an eyeload of me
That I once was a lady as proud as could be?
Oh I’d never sit down by a tumbledown drunk
If it wasn’t, my dears, for the high cost of junk.

‘All the gents used to swear that the white of my calf
Beat the down of the swan by a length and a half.
In the kerchief of linen I caught to my nose
Ah, there never fell snot, but a little gold rose.

‘I had seven gold teeth and a toothpick of gold,
My Virginia cheroot was a leaf of it rolled
And I’d light it each time with a thousand in cash–
Why the bums used to fight if I flicked them an ash.

‘Once the toast of the Biltmore, the belle of the Taft,
I would drink bottle beer at the Drake, never draught,
And dine at the Astor on Salisbury steak
With a clean tablecloth for each bite I did take.

‘In a car like the Roxy I’d roll to the track,
A steel-guitar trio, a bar in the back,
And the wheels made no noise, they turned ever so fast,
Still it took you ten minutes to see me go past.

‘When the horses bowed down to me that I might choose,
I bet on them all, for I hated to lose.
Now I’m saddled each night for my butter and eggs
And the broken threads race down the backs of my legs.

‘Let you hold in mind, girls, that your beauty must pass
Like a lovely white clover that rusts with its grass.
Keep your bottoms off barstools and marry you young
Or be left an old barrel with many a bung.

‘For when time takes you out for a spin in his car
You’ll be hard-pressed to stop him from going too far
And be left by the roadside, for all your good deeds,
Two toadstools for tits and a face full of weeds.’

All the house raised a cheer, but the man at the bar
Made a phone call and up pulled a red patrol car
And she blew us a kiss as they copped her away
From that prominent bar in Secaucus, N.J.

Let Evening Come, by Jane Kenyon (1947-1995)

Let the light of late afternoon
shine through chinks in the barn, moving
up the bales as the sun moves down.

Let the cricket take up chafing
as a woman takes up her needles
and her yarn. Let evening come.

Let dew collect on the hoe abandoned
in long grass. Let the stars appear
and the moon disclose her silver horn.

Let the fox go back to its sandy den.
Let the wind die down. Let the shed
go black inside. Let evening come.

To the bottle in the ditch, to the scoop
in the oats, to air in the lung
let evening come.

Let it come, as it will, and don’t
be afraid. God does not leave us
comfortless, so let evening come.

Cameo Appearance, by Charles Simic (1938-)

I had a small nonspeaking part

In a bloody epic. I was one of the

Bombed and fleeing humanity.

In the distance the great leader

Crowed like a rooster from a balcony,

Or was it a great actor

Impersonating the great leader?

There’s me there, I said to the kiddies.

I’m squeezed between the man

With two bandaged hands raised

And the old woman with her mouth open

As if she were showing us a tooth

That hurts badly. The hundred times

I rewound the tape, not once

Could they catch sight of me

In that huge gray crowd,

That was like any other gray crowd.

Trot off to bed, I said finally.

I know I was there. One take

Is all they had time for.

We ran, and the planes grazed our hair,

And then there were no more

As we stood dazed in the burning city,

But, of course, they didn’t film that.

Discrimination, by Kenneth Rexroth (1905-1982)

Luke Havergal, by Edwin Arlington Robinson (1869-1935)

Bell Tower, by Leonie Adams (1899-1988)

I have seen, O desolate one, the voice has its tower,

The voice also, builded at secret cost,

In temple of precious tissue. Not silent then

Forever – casting silence in your hour.

There marble boys are leant from the light throat,

Thick locks that hang with dew and eyes dewlashed,

Dazzled with morning, angels of the wind,

With ear a-point to the enchanted note.

And these at length shall tip the hanging bell,

And first the sound must gather in deep bronze,

Till, rarer than ice, purer than a bubble of gold,

It fill the sky to beat on an airy shell.