Aren't there bigger things to talk about Than a window in Greenwich Village And hyacinths sprouting Like little puce poems out of a sick soul? Some cosmic hearsay-- As to whom--it can't be Mars! put the moon--that way.... Or what winds do to canyons Under the tall stars... Or even How that old roué, Neptune, Cranes over his bald-head moons At the twinkling heel of a sky-scraper.
Skyscrapers... remote, unpartisan... Turning neither to the right nor left Your imperturbable fronts.... Austerely greeting the sun With one chilly finger of stone.... I know your secrets... better than all the policemen like fat blue mullet along the avenues.
Dour river Jaded with monotony of lights Diving off mast heads.... Lights mad with creating in a river... turning its sullen back... Heave up, river... Vomit back into the darkness your spawn of light.... The night will gut what you give her.
The earth is motionless And poised in space... A great bird resting in its flight Between the alleys of the stars. It is the wind's hour off.... The wind has nestled down among the corn.... The two speak privately together, Awaiting the whirr of wings.
Secrets infesting my half-sleep... did you enter my wound from another wound brushing mine in a crowd... or did I snare you on my sharper edges as a bird flying through cobwebbed trees at sun-up carries off spiders on its wings?
Secrets, running over my soul without sound, only when dawn comes tip-toeing ushered by a suave wind, and dreams disintegrate like breath shapes in frosty air, I shall overhear you, bare-foot, scatting off into the darkness.... I shall know you, secrets by the litter you have left and by your bloody foot-prints.
Do you remember Honey-melon moon Dripping thick sweet light Where Canal Street saunters off by herself among quiet trees? And the faint decayed patchouli-- Fragrance of New Orleans Like a dead tube rose Upheld in the warm air... Miraculously whole.
Blow through me wind As you blow through apple blossoms.... Scatter me in shining petals over the passers-by.... Joyously I reunite... sway and gather to myself.... Sedately I walk by the dancing feet of children-- Not knowing I too dance over the cobbled spring. O, but they laugh back at me, (Eyes like daisies smiling wide open), And we both look askance at the snowed-in people Thinking me one of them.
Your love was like moonlight turning harsh things to beauty, so that little wry souls reflecting each other obliquely as in cracked mirrors... beheld in your luminous spirit their own reflection, transfigured as in a shining stream, and loved you for what they are not.
You are less an image in my mind than a luster I see you in gleams pale as star-light on a gray wall... evanescent as the reflection of a white swan shimmering in broken water.
Lola Ridge was an Irish-American modernist poet born in 1873 in Dublin, Ireland, and died in 1941 in New York City. She spent her early years in New Zealand and Australia before moving to the United States around 1907. She became a central figure in the New York avant-garde literary scene, serving as an editor for the magazines Others and Broom. Her poetry frequently addressed themes of urban poverty, industrialization, and the lives of immigrants and workers. Her first collection, The Ghetto and Other Poems (1918), depicted the Jewish immigrant community of New York's Lower East Side. In her work, she employed free verse and stark, vivid imagery to convey the harsh realities of modern city life. She was also involved in radical political movements, advocating for labor rights and social reform. Her subsequent collections include Sun-Up and Other Poems (1920), Red Flag (1927), and Firehead (1929). Her poetry contributed to the development of American modernism, particularly in its exploration of social consciousness. Her work is associated with the development of American modernist poetry, particularly in its engagement with social and political issues.
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