Bodies
body of land
lost as a hand
in a pocket
body of debt
able to keep wheels going
in the heart
Contemplative poems
Contemplative poems — a collection of the best works on PoemShip.
In hac spe vivo
the wren gives me
small hopes
but I can hear the sea
a prophesy of love
some parts very good
others devilish
and me alone
with the world
Lady of winter
pretty as sin
pretty as sickness
I do not care
but am glad
to be pretty
as the ice
Expiration date
if it is dead
it is ours to keep
or put on ice
till night
or sit with and get
to be at ease
Discursed
a mole managing a stone
my life under discourse
poor and broken
are my books
nothing but oysters
opened for a late supper
Noon people
make nothing
seem not to doubt
standing as quiet
as a ruin
I love to see them
Journalist
born a creature
into this wounded world
with strange apprehensions
I am but a pen
so full of news
my raw account
of the quiet
Tunnel Vision
The trail is a straight tunnel
through dripping woods.
In last night’s dream, I’d been
ready to cross a mountain
where roads & trails
hadn’t yet been thought of,
not even by the animals.
On the far side, my brothers
had found another hollow
parallel to this one, where
riotous growth pressed
against the windowpanes
& light-starved houseplants
rotted in their pots.
But this morning,
the trail ends as always
Outer self
to give like the grave
our outer self
a thin king
of the afternoon
that mission in which
I do not believe
Tree music
all the music of a tree
is to make it go
more than art or play
a festival of use
a faith that we hear
as singing
being
beyond
Listener
up and down town
thinking about drinking
as the world offered little
but contrary ears
I love the industrious sand
of men’s thoughts
I hear the eunuch sing
such a never-imagined ache
and the martyrs make me open
volumes of shame
Theogony
I am whoever I am
I am however who
I should not be
(or so my management
which is one Word
tells me)
a candle that set
my wig aflame
love like a door
on a summer day
an almost kiss in the ear
seldom speaking
(I cannot believe
who I am)
Describe a feeling — we’ll find a poem
Or try: