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THE SYMPTOM
Beauty corrects the symptom known to us as sight. Never, never, will the eyes see things right. So beauty must fix the mistakes we see. Or life and art would both be ugly. We survive, but beauty is...
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TELL US WHAT HE TOLD YOU
Poetry! Tell us what the famous poet told you! He told me he loved her as a poet, That he knew no other way. He sacrificed his language, And all common affections, to poetry, But he was stricken with...
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THE GIANT SHY EGO
Give me a sign. Rosalinda, are you definitely mine? I will wait all day, So take your time. But definitely say: Definitely mine. The world is a point, In the middle of a line, I made a point with a...
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A POEM INSPIRED BY BEETHOVEN’S LAST TESTAMENT
When the artistic invades the non-artistic, which it always does, (Cathedral scenes inevitably have circling pigeons and doves) Creating metaphors in the mind of a love which failed— (We know...
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THE ONE I LOVED BEFORE YOU
The one I loved before you I could not understand. She was the dry sea. But I love you. The soaked land. When I first saw her, the skeleton which moves And how it moves, was the first thing I loved,...
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I BETTER LOVE YOU
When we think too much We lose the love we just want to touch— And presently, material things and gold Will turn love into what we cannot hold. What is love? When I thought a lot about this I planned...
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THE BEST SINGING
The best singing belongs To songs no one sings. I didn’t hear voices for days. What she said, I put to the side. I need to select what stays. Great wholes in the fabric Of life, those forgotten days....
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USEFUL ARE THESE FIELDS
Useful are these fields, Useless that moon. Put the hay in the barn! The winter comes soon. The fields will lie under snow, But the moon will look the same. Useful things suffer the shocks Of time....
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MATHEMATICIANS ARE BEAUTIFUL
Mathematicians are beautiful. They don’t care about you guys. They surprise the surprise. Mathematics is a thing, A thing seen, a thing made into things, As well as the structure of your eyes....
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EVERYONE LOOKS NORMAL
Everyone looks normal, except me. Why don’t I look normal to the same degree? To look normal, I have to stare at myself for hours. Do I look the same as the other flowers? There are many flowers. But...
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DELMORE SCHWARTZ AND THE MODERN COMPLAINT
The peculiar error of the modern poets—an error so obvious as to escape attention—was the continual investigation of what it meant to be modern, a term by which these 20th century poets (our...
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THE EYES MAKE DECISIONS
The eyes make decisions. The sleepy brain feels The eyes are too quick to judge— Doubting the eyes can know about love. The eyes wait on arms and lips to bless What they love. How cruelly the eyes...
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“DAMN TRUTH AND LOOK ON BEAUTY TILL IT BEGINS TO HURT”
Anand Thakore, poet and musician Whenever poetry is discussed, the smartest person in the room (or on social media) inevitably defines poetry as a linguistic construction—meant merely to please. The...
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THE OBLIGATION OF YOUR VACATION
Don’t count the days until it ends. Don’t, in your leisure, sink into news stories, Especially the murderous, insane ones. Don’t form new routines. Be new. Let your vacation be about you. Don’t take a...
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I AM LAZY AND I DON’T CARE
I am lazy and I don’t care. You work, but I’m beyond that place And see the uselessness of getting there. The best words are the long words, The words that are better than sentences, and express How I...
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THE FEELING I GET WHEN I SIT NEXT TO YOU
Whenever I’m in my favorite café The lonely writer will often sit Beside me, some older guy With a laptop working on shit. The lonely woman doesn’t exist. No matter what, she has an air Of ghosts, of...
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POETRY ADVICE
Every one of my poems—if you want to know the secret Of my poems—is a form of poetry advice— Even if the poem seems to be about something else; seriously, this is it. This might seem incredibly...
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SEX VERSUS NOSTALGIA
Nostalgia needs time, People and a place—the proximity Of her to the inlets and bays And the trains that shoot past, The cavernous central station Where we bought coffee among crowds, The inlets and...
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SO THIS IS WHAT YOU THINK ABOUT THINGS
So this is what you think about things. Sigh. It would be easier, far easier, If you sat in the darling dark with your beloved Playing the piano—standards of jazz and classical, Professional and...
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I AM MORE CONFIDENT THAN EVER THAT YOU LOVE ME
I am more confident than ever that you love me. Look at all this silence you match with mine. Who breathes, thinks, or talks, when inspiration gulps wine? You and I are silent like eternity. The dream...
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