Early May 2011 Poems

"The place where God calls you is the place where your deep gladness meets the

 world's deep hunger."
 

  Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking                    

Optimistic Little Poem

Now and then it happens

that somebody shouts for help

and somebody else jumps in at once

and absolutely gratis .

Here in the thick of the grossest capitalism

round the corner comes the shining fire brigade

and extinguishes, or suddenly

there's silver in the beggar's hat

Mornings the streets are full

of people hurrying here and there without

daggers in their hands, quite equably

after milk or radishes.

As though in a time of deepest peace.

A splendid sight.

Hans Magnus Enzensberger ( b. 1929)

Translated by David Constantine

N.W. 2: Spring

The poets never lied when they praised 

Spring in England.

                                   Even in this neat suburb

You can feel there's something to

                                                              their pastorals.

Something gentle, broadly nostalgic, is stirring

On the well-aired pavements.

                                                           Indrawn brick

Sighs, and you notice the sudden sharpness

Of things growing.

                                    The sun lightens

The significance of what the houses

Are steeped in,

                               brightens out

Their winter brooding.

                                            Early May

Touches also the cold diasporas

That England hardly mentions.

A.C. Jacobs ( 1937-94)

Dockside

Sat by the water for hours. Watched nothing but water,

how it was spelt out by light;

its mass like silk blown in slow-moving wind,

                 

                        or the glitter of fisted diamonds that flickered and

                                                                  kicked

as the waves caught the light

from the bounce of the sun and I squinted my eyes

                                             and saw every one

of those diamonds that tickled and swam,

or how the light lay like a curve

in a ripple of time, on that wet pool

and I thought of a painter

jig-sawing brushstrokes of yellow 

over the salty-sea blue.

Amna Ahmed

In the Poem

To bring the picture the wall the wind

The flower the glass the shine on wood

And the cold chaste clearness of water

To the clean severe world of the poem

To save from decay and ruin

The actual moment of vision and surprise

And keep in the real world

The real gesture of a hand touching the table

Sophia de Mello Breyner (b. 1919)

Translated by Ruth Fainlight

                                                              

 Web

The deftest leave no trace: type, send, delete,

clear history. The world will never know.

Though a man might wonder, as he crossed the street

what it was that broke across his brow

or vanished on his tongue and left it sweet

Don Paterson (b.1963)