A Little After Sappho

Yes!

Yes, beloved, come to me,
and stay beside me here.
Listen to me chatter,
listen to me peal.

Only let me lean to you
and hear you talk to me:

on a blanket, shadow-hatched;
at the table, near and glad;
by the river, willow-pied;
on the pillow, just awake --

brush your hands across my hair
and let me lean to you.

Only let me sit with you
and hear you read to me:

in the twilight, opal-dim;
through the rainfall, low and grey;
with the daylight’s quickening;
when the sun is slanting gold --

brush your hands across my face
and let me sit with you.

Only let me look at you
and hear you play to me:

let me see you arch and stretch;
let me watch you tap and pluck;
let me know the ordered chords;
let me feel them, keen and sweet --

only let me stay with you,
and you shall hear me peal.

Found

Now let the fish-hawks call in pairs
from the sandbars in the stream.

And let us take the painted boat
through the cresses on the lake.

And let us track the silver sun
on the ripples, on the waves.

And let us have the bell and drum --
ringing bell and beating drum --

With bells and drums let us rejoice;
with bells and drums let us be glad.

The Well is Deep in Thistle

The well is deep in thistle;
It clumps and crowds the stones.
The tufts are incense-purple,
The leaves are green as brine.
So dense and thick it grows here,
The stones cannot be seen.
However could you see them?
The thistle is too full.

Sir: tell me when the riddles
Began to fret the edge --
I saw them rip the core, Sir;
I saw that day with you.
Since you, Sir, would not keep me,
You ought to tell me this.
Sir, bend your head and tell me:
Acknowledge what you owe.

The well is deep in bracken;
It rustles on the stones.
The fronds are sere and whirring;
They rattle in the air.
Just try to drop a stone in:
You cannot hear a splash.
However could you hear it?
The soughing is so loud.

My Mother! Tell me, show me!
You heard the fringes tear.
Remind me how they sounded;
Unfold the things you know.
If only I could reckon,
How easy I would be!
But till the threads unravel
Who understands the fray?

The well is deep in bramble;
It snakes across the stones.
The spines are harsh and jagged,
As long as crickets’ wings.
So thick the bramble grows here,
You cannot walk this way.
However could you walk here?
The thorns are far too sharp.

My Father! Tell me, show me!
You saw it sailing near.
Point out the spotted sky-line;
Another time I’ll know.
Then, Father, give me comfort,
For just a little space.
It isn’t that I’m daunted --
But who could fail to balk?

The well is deep in thistle;
It clumps and crowds the stones.
And you, Sir, far away now,
Are you not thick with shame?

Only

across the black sky,
torch-foot;

beside the pillow,
salt-wet;

beneath the cherry,
blinded;

in the milk-jug;
on the table;
by the bookshelf;
at the window.

crimped and crippled,
torn and shaken;

retch- rejecting,
lash-assailing;

wringing
rearing,
writhing
reeling --

This principle unpaired;
this tale alone.

(Zhong-zi, Please)

Meet me on the broad road,
Where all the ways converge.
It isn’t that I love you --
But let me see you there.

Meet me on the high road,
The track aross the ridge.
You’re nothing but a shard now --
Still, show me where you’ve been.

Meet me on the mill road,
The path beside the weir.
There’s nothing you can give me --
Still, let me pluck your sleeve.

Meet me on the hedged road,
Where hawthorn lines the lane.
I would not keep you long there --
Still, let me speak with you.

Meet me on the broad road,
Where all the ways converge.
It isn’t that I love you --
But let me see you there.

All

Distress,
let it be fierce as aloes,
still,

it goes unreckoned,
fills no tally,
shores up no account.

A desert parches.

Let it be wide enough,
bare enough,

you bleach there.

That is all.

They lie

who summon consolation:
the shorn lamb
and the tempered wind.

Let the wind be cold enough,
the lamb freezes.

That is all.

Admonition

(To an old schoolfellow departing for the mountains of the East, there to practice her profession and indulge her taste for the far away.)

You do not owe me this, but still I charge you:

In the name of common cause
between all fellows,
kith of every kind

— yoke-mated in formation,
axle-paired, aligned in step,

or scattered as the Pleiades,
flung piecemeal, cast haphazard —

think of me.

Ringed azure
by the mountain sky,

do this:

watch the sundial;
let it tell a quarter-circuit;
while you wait, reflect;

think of my days.

You will be far from me.
Still,
your mind’s eye should
fetch forth a picture:

no sundials where I am;
there never will be.
No ridge, no blaze of blue,
no crack of rock.
No slow sigh of moss
beneath a lizard’s
winking patter-weight.
None of these things.

Healing is your business.

But, while you watch the sundial,
do this:

think humbly on wounds.

Think on loss and ravages.
Think on what is gone.

For a quarter-circuit,
think of me.

Then, when the wheel of things has called you home,
come;
look at me.

Pale gold with upland air,

come to me and look me in the face.

Keepsake

Green, green, the grass in the paddock.
Roan, roan, round runs the foal.

Wandlimbed and nimble,
sniffing the morning,
trotting and loping,
around runs the foal.

Dusk in the meadow:
lady’s-smock glimmers;
breath just beginning,
the night-scented stock.

Bulk in the belfry:
owl is staring.
White and five-witted,
he stares at the night.

Drums in the distance,
striving and shouting,
fire and clamour,
and clouds like the pine.

Ashes and knotgrass,
crater and rubble;
whirling, alighting,
a murder of crows.

Green, green, the grass in the paddock.
Roan, roan, round runs the foal.

Strand Song

This is the matin-bell.
Bird twines a spiral
of floss and waking air.
Dawning splashes sand and
singeth loudly, lowly
all through fog and foam.
Night creeps beneath the
sea-long
plumes and whiting waves.

Wild

Now I dream myself a pair of wings.
Bat-like at first they spread across my cheeks
In the dark glimmer of a windowpane,
Fine leather stretching over hollow bone.
My eyes grow huge and frank in their pale rings
And feather-tufted, balanced on a hook
Between the fawny spectacles of down.
Now outwards, up, the wings grow stiffly plumed,
And angled at my back. I swivel East
To see the moon now hanging caught behind
The cobweb-patterned elms, and now tugged free.
Then, on the singing sighs of wind, the sounds
Scratch-scurry-patter-whirring in the grass:
A crooked ridge, its rocks as white as geese
And drenched with spray; a gushing rivulet:
Li T’ai Po borrowed Duke Hsieh’s storied clogs
To scale his azure stairways frail as fog;
But I wear only feathers, wind-fret sails,
And stretch my claws as if to snatch the moon.
Beneath, Diana lifts her head at me.
Ulula: hear her long contralto moan.

Consoling Myself Without Climbing a Tower

My tongue is too bitter
for drinking tea.
So it stays empty,
my pretty cup.

The dumplings taste wrong, too,
sour and flat.
Still, the maids pleat them,
leaving me out.

I can’t bear the guitar:
twang hurts my ears.
and books are no comfort:
can’t fix my eyes.

But now in the lamplight,
rice paper glows.
The ink still looks glossy,
true panther-black:

white sun ends at the mountains,
yellow river flows into the sea;
to survey the whole thousand miles,
climb again, one storey more.

So, somewhere, a tower,
sea, river, hills.
The view from the summit:
miles of space.

February Evening, Recovering Perhaps

Heartbeat uneven,
limbs clumsy and limp.
But, from the lakeside,
a beckoning chill.

Pied flurry flashes
then hangs in the sky:
black, white on eggshell,
and clasping a twig.

Morning Without Promise

Sky blank and flat;
Behind the clouds, glare.
Can anything
Remain upright long?