999. The Good Shepherd - Stanley Moss

.

Because he would not abandon the flock for a lost sheep

after the others had bedded down for the night,

he turned back, searched the thickets and gullies.

Sleepless, while the flock dozed in the morning mist

he searched the pastures up ahead. Winter nearing,

our wool heavy with brambles, ropes of muddy ice,

he did not abandon the lost sheep, even when the snows came.

Still, I knew there was only a thin line

between the good shepherd and the butcher.

How many lambs had put their heads between the shepherd’s knees,

closed their eyes, offering their neck to the knife?

Familiar – the quick thuds of the club doing its work.

More than once at night I saw the halo coming.

I ran like a deer and hid among rocks,

or I crawled under a bush, my heart in thorns.

During the day I lived my life in clover

watching out for the halo.

I swore on the day the good shepherd catches hold,

trying to wrestle me to the ground and bind my feet,

I will buck like a ram and bite like a wolf,

although I taste the famous blood

I will break loose! I will race under the gates of heaven,

back to the mortal fields, my flock, my stubbled grass and mud.

998. Compass - Jorge Luis Borges

  Translated from the Spanish by Alastair Reed

Every single thing becomes a word

in a language that Someone or Something, night and day,

writes down in a never-ending scribble,

which is the history of the world, embracing

Rome, Carthage, you, me, everyone,

my life, which I do not understand, this anguish

of being enigma, accident, and puzzle,

and all the discordant languages of Babel.

Behind each name lies that which has no name.

Today I felt its nameless shadow tremble

in the blue clarity of the compass needle,

whose rule extends as far as the far seas,

something like a clock glimpsed in a dream

or a bird that stirs suddenly in its sleep.

997. Hojoki - Kennith Rexroth

Hojoki by Kennith Rexroth

A thing unknown for years, 

Rain falls heavily in June, 

On the ripe cherries, and on 

The half cut hay. 

Above the glittering 

Grey water of the inlet, 

In the driving, light filled mist, 

A blue heron 

Catches mice in the green 

And copper and citron swathes. 

I walk on the rainy hills. 

It is enough.

996. The Real World - Wislawa Szymborska

Translated by S. Barańczak and C. Cavanagh

The real world doesn’t take flight

the way dreams do.

No muffled voice, no doorbell

can dispel it,

no shriek, no crash

can cut it short.

Images in dreams

are hazy and ambiguous,

and can generally be explained

in many different ways.

Reality means reality:

that’s a tougher nut to crack.

Dreams have keys.

The real world opens on its own

and can’t be shut.

Report cards and stars

pour from it,

butterflies and flatiron warmers

shower down,

headless caps

and shards of clouds.

Together they form a rebus

that can’t be solved.

Without us dreams couldn’t exist.

The one on whom the real world depends

is still unknown,

and the products of his insomnia

are available to anyone

who wakes up.

Dreams aren’t crazy—

it’s the real world that’s insane,

if only in the stubbornness

with which it sticks

to the current of events.

It dreams our recently deceased

are still alive,

in perfect health, no less,

and restored to the full bloom of youth.

The real world lays the corpse

in front of us.

The real world doesn’t blink an eye.

Dreams are featherweights,

and memory can shake them off with ease.

The real world doesn’t have to fear forgetfulness.

It’s a tough customer.

It sits on our shoulders,

weighs on our hearts,

tumbles to our feet.

There’s no escaping it,

it tags along each time we flee.

And there’s no stop

along our escape route

where reality isn’t expecting us.

995. Villanelle For Our Time - Frank Scott

.

From bitter searching of the heart,

Quickened with passion and with pain

We rise to play a greater part.

This is the faith from which we start:

Men shall know commonwealth again

From bitter searching of the heart.

We loved the easy and the smart,

But now, with keener hand and brain,

We rise to play a greater part.

The lesser loyalties depart

And neither race nor creed remain

From bitter searching of the heart.

Not steering by the venal chart

That tricked the mass for private gain,

We rise to play a greater part.

Reshaping narrow law and art

Whose symbols are the millions slain,

From bitter searching of the heart

We rise to play a greater part.

994. For The Living - Stephen Meadows

.

Standing high on this hillside

the wind off the Pacific

forming the language of grasses

and escarpment eternally speaking

the sea birds far out

on their planes of air

gather and squander

what the short days encompass

We make what we can

of what reason can give us

we take from these all too brief moments

some reckoning of meaning

hoping as we hurtle haphazard

through this storm of a cosmos

to make some small imprint

while the birds in their white realm

reeling over the tumbling green ocean

this plated earth gliding

beneath us like a wind

under shoulders

and the language we hear

in the grass on this hillside

is all of it mythic and wondrous

as the Goddesses dream

993. Andree Rexroth by Kenneth Rexroth

Mt. Tamalpais

The years have gone. It is spring

Again. Mars and Saturn will

Soon come on, low in the West,

In the dusk. Now the evening

Sunlight makes hazy girders

Over Steep Ravine above 

The waterfalls. The winter

Birds from Oregon, robins

And varied thrushes, feast on

Ripe toyon and madrone

Berries. The robins sing as

The dense light falls,

Your Ashes

Were scattered in this place. Here

I wrote you a farewell poem,

And long ago another,

A poem of peace and love,

Of the lassitude of a long

Spring evening in youth. Now

It is almost ten years since

You came here to stay. Once more,

The pussy willows that come

After the New Year in this

Outlandish land are blooming.

There are deer and raccoon tracks

In the same places. A few

New sand bars and cobble beds

Have been left where erosion

Has gnawed deep into the hills.

The rounds of life are narrow.

War and peace have past like ghosts.

The human race sinks towards

Oblivion. A bittern

Calls from the same rushes where

You heard one on our first year

In the West; and where I heard

One again in the year

Of your death.

992. Zazen on Ching-t’ing Mountain - Li Po

.

The birds have vanished down the sky,

Now the last cloud drains away.

We sit together, the mountain and me,

until only the mountain remains.

991. Eagle Poem - Joy Harjo

Joy Harjo - Eagle Poem

To pray you open your whole self

To sky, to earth, to sun, to moon

To one whole voice that is you.

And know there is more

That you can’t see, can’t hear;

Can’t know except in moments

Steadily growing, and in languages

That aren’t always sound but other

Circles of motion.

Like eagle that Sunday morning

Over Salt River. Circled in blue sky

In wind, swept our hearts clean

With sacred wings.

We see you , see ourselves and know

That we must take the utmost care

And kindness in all things.

Breathe in, knowing we are made of

All this, and breathe, knowing

We are truly blessed because we 

Were born, and die soon within a

True circle of motion,

Like eagle rounding the morning

Inside us.

We pray that it will be done

In beauty.

In beauty.

990. An Idea - Wislawa Szymborska

Translated from the Polish by Clare Cavanagh and Stanislaw Baranczak

An idea came to me

for a rhyme? a poem?

Well, fine — I say — stay awhile, we’ll talk.

Tell me a little more about yourself.

So it whispered a few words in my ear.

Ah, so that’s the story — I say — intriguing.

These matters have long weighed upon my heart.

But a poem about them? I don’t think so.

So it whispered a few words in my ear.

It may seem that way — I reply —

but you overestimate my gifts and powers.

I wouldn’t even know where to start.

So it whispered a few words in my ear.

You’re wrong — I say — a short, pithy poem

is much harder than a long one.

Don’t pester me, don’t nag, it won’t turn out.

So it whispered a few words in by ear.

All right then, I’ll try, since you insist.

But don’t say I didn’t warn you.

I write, tear it up, and toss it out.

So it whispered a few words in by ear.

You’re right — I say — there are always other poets.

Some of them can do better.

I’ll give you names and addresses.

So it whispered a few words in by ear.

Of course I’ll envy them.

We envy even the weak poems.

But this one should . . . it ought to have . . .

So it whispered a few words in my ear.

Exactly, to have the qualities you’ve listed.

So let’s change the subject.

How about a cup of coffee?

  It just sighed.

And started vanishing.

And vanished.