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Blog entries by Merry
from The Meaning of Tingo: And Other Extraordinary Words from Around the World
by Adam Jacot de Boinod
tingo (Pascunese, Easter Island) to take all the objects one desires from the house of a friend, one at a time, by borrowing them
neko-neko (Indonesian) one who has a creative idea...
from The Children's Ward
by Jane Cooper
Take her north to a doctor you can trust. She's dying, and you're dying watching her. That's the way my mother told the story to my aunt. . . .
. . .
My mother didn't want to leave me alone on the ward but I was delighted. Every day while...
from The Infusion Room
by Jane Cooper
Mercy on Marianne who through a hole beneath her collarbone drinks
the life-preserving fluid, while in her arm
another IV tube drips something green. It never effects me, she says,
I'm fortunate.
She has Crohn's and rheumatoid arthritis and now...
from Winter: Five Windows on the Season
by Adam Gopnik
. . . [US naval master Dr. E. K.] Kane and his men, on their way to rescue four of their companions in the Arctic in 1854, suffer from hypothermia so severe that they fall asleep for hours at a time standing up, then turn and wake...
In the Field
by J. E. Wei
The bungalow is empty now. The clock swings in silence. (I see Grandpa taking me to the urine bucket on a mossy floor, where bamboo curtains moldered.) The bigger room of the first uncle is filled with webs; over there, the second uncles smells dusty; the...
Three Poems
by Ted Kooser
Horse
In its stall stands the 19th century,
its hide a hot shudder of satin,
head stony and willful,
an eye brown as a river and watchful:
a sentry a long way ahead
of a hard, dirty army of hooves.
A Winter Morning
A farmhouse window far back...
Sometime the Cow Kick Your Head
by Andrew J. Grossman
Sometime the cow kick your head
Sometime she just moo
Even the cow don't know
What she going to do
Until she look at you
Knocked out upon the ground
And she say, "Woo
My leg do that to him"
This poem was published...
The Yellow Bicycle
by Robert Hass
The woman I love is greedy,
but she refuses greed.
She walks so straightly.
When I ask her what she wants,
she says, A yellow bicycle.
.
Sun, sunflower,
coltsfoot on the roadside,
a goldfinch, the sign
that says Yield, her hair...
Four Short Poems by Four Poets
Longing
Ever since you touched my wrist, the world is a room full
of apples.
- Kate Angus
Two Men in a Bathroom
When the son must
shave the father
since the old man's hand
began to shake too much
to draw the straight razor
smoothly...
Mutations of Immortality
from an interview with Christian Bok conducted by Jonathan Ball
Could you describe your next project?
The Xenotext Experiment is responding to the millenial science of genetics. I'm trying to write a book of poetry in which I translate a single poem, through a...
One Hundred and First Reason to Stay in Your Room
by Franz Wright
I was just coming from a visit to my doctor. Not the medical one this time, though they both work for the same company. One of those inimitably dark April days in Boston, the cold returned, though not in a big way: gray...
Autumn Day
by Rainer Maria Rilke
Lord, it is time. The summer was too long.
Lay down thy shadow over the sundials,
and on the meadows let the winds blow strong.
Bid the last fruit to ripen on the vine;
allow them still two friendly southern days
to bring them to perfection and to...
21 Greguerias
by Daniel Liebert
1. Sunlight 90 million miles and then through a baby's ear.
2. Old shoes speak the pungent slang of feet.
3. Musical instruments go blind in pawnshop windows.
4. A coffee ring on a book is the hoof-print of Pegasus.
5. Birds began as...
from Mirrors of the Unseen: Journeys in Iran
by Jason Elliot
I had come to a small village on the edge of the desert to follow an unlikely clue. Years before, I had read an enigmatic mention of "a monastery in Persia" where visitors were said to weep spontaneously on entering a...
Sleep Aid
by Dean Young
Do you wake up sooner than you go to sleep?
Do you have trouble falling?
Is your heart made of fire but your mouth ash?
Do you think of your life as a black hole
and everything hurried along,
every amphibian, every eyelash
hurried along?
What other drugs...
The Job Application
by Robert Walser
Esteemed gentlemen,
I am a poor, young, unemployed person in the business field, my name is Wenzel, I am
seeking a suitable position, and I take the liberty of asking you, nicely and politely, if
perhaps in your airy, bright, amiable rooms...
from The Business Guide: On Safe Methods of Business
by J. L. Nichols, A. M.
(1904 edition; originally published 1886)
Genius, Capital, Skill, Labor
Here is a comparative table of genius, capital, skill, labor, on the mutual basis of the almighty dollar.
Genius. The power...
[For those who have trouble reading large blocks of text, I have, below the text in original formatting, broken up the long paragraph of the prose poem.]
Young Armless Man in the Barbecue Restaurant
by Phyllis Koestenbaum
The hostess seats a girl and a young man in a short-sleeve sport...
An Apology
by F. J. Bergmann
Forgive me
for backing over
and smashing
your red wheelbarrow.
It was raining
and the rear wiper
does not work on
my new plum-colored SUV.
I am also sorry
about the white
chickens.
This poem was a finalist for the 2003 James...
from The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference
by Malcolm Gladwell
. . . To be someone's best friend requires a minimum investment in time. More than that, though, it takes emotional energy. Caring about someone deeply is exhausting. At a certain point, somewhere...