id stringlengths 16 16 | title stringlengths 1 203 | author stringlengths 2 40 | poem stringlengths 1 87.3k | labels_l1 listlengths 1 10 | labels_l2 listlengths 0 15 | labels_l1_names listlengths 1 10 | labels_l2_names listlengths 0 15 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
c41cc1b4d503b19b | Poem about My Rights | June Jordan | Even tonight and I need to take a walk and clear
my head about this poem about why I can’t
go out without changing my clothes my shoes
my body posture my gender identity my age
my status as a woman alone in the evening/
alone on the streets/alone not being the point/
the point being that I can’t do what I want
t... | [
"S3",
"S4"
] | [
"S3-4",
"S3-6",
"S3-11"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Social Commentaries/Gender & Sexuality",
"Social Commentaries/Incarceration & Justice"
] |
0afef62ed92d3cb4 | He Sees Through Stone | Etheridge Knight | He sees through stone
he has the secret eyes
this old black one
who under prison skies
sits pressed by the sun
against the western wall
his pipe between purple gums
the years fall
like overripe plums
bursting red flesh
on the dark earth
his time is not my time
but I have known him
in a time gone
he led me... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S7"
] | [
"S3-6"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/Incarceration & Justice"
] |
3bfe8d41cbcf589e | Mariana | Alfred, Lord Tennyson | "Mariana in the Moated Grange"
(Shakespeare, Measure for Measure | [
"S1",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S1-3",
"S1-4",
"S1-6",
"S1-9",
"S6-5"
] | [
"Love",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Love/Heartache & Loss",
"Love/Infatuation & Crushes",
"Love/Realistic & Complicated",
"Love/Unrequited Love",
"Living/Mourning"
] |
de0fbc024678e466 | American Cowslip | Ron Padgett | Nothing is
the way you think it is
going to be.
Take this little flower
from me, and let it go
into the way you think of it.
And so it grows
and is the face
of Daisy the cow speaking,
she my young grandma
growing and wearing
a pink slip and who fell
from the sky that was
clear blue and pure
all over the p... | [
"S2",
"S6"
] | [
"S2-7",
"S2-8",
"S2-9"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living"
] | [
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Nature/Plants & Fungi",
"Nature/Stars, Moons, & Space"
] |
ce65fc54cbd76c94 | a little hopeful song | Bernadette Hall | For Síle
I give thee the sun as guarantee
and the Egyptian faience beads
and the little silver oar that was gifted once
to an English harbor master.
I give thee the silk dress
with its triple-ruffled sleeves and
the cloaks with big hoods that fall full
though some are pulled in at a central button.
I give thee... | [
"S2",
"S6"
] | [
"S2-5"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living"
] | [
"Nature/Animals"
] |
3ab73d48e1d6b6d7 | The Young Blake | Elizabeth Willis | sleeps into heaven with his lamps on, finishing explan-
atory negotiations for a while. Desert the enemy. Star
formations, sandstone understanding, rock time in gen-
eral, whatever. Latching onto ecstasy, words that change
on waking, clover as a syrup of spring mind. Working
off a deficit of sleep or cash, you kno... | [
"S10"
] | [
"S10-6"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets"
] |
181f916de0970574 | The Owl | Edward Thomas | Downhill I came, hungry, and yet not starved; Cold, yet had heat within me that was proof Against the North wind; tired, yet so that rest Had seemed the sweetest thing under a roof. Then at the inn I had food, fire, and rest, Knowing how hungry, cold, and tired was I. All of the night was quite barred out except An owl... | [
"S2",
"S3",
"S9"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S9-1"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries",
"Activities"
] | [
"Nature/Animals",
"Activities/Eating & Drinking"
] |
006df0aec6b40262 | Dance, Dance, While the Hive Collapses | Tiffany Higgins | Oh my, oh my, I lose myselfI study atlases and cirrus pathsin search of traces of it, of you of that thing, of that song I keep pressing my ear to the current of air to hear ... I hear it and it disappears It was all I wanted to do in this life to sense that phantom tap on my nerves, to allow myselfto be hit by it, at... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S7"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S2-8"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [
"Nature/Animals",
"Nature/Plants & Fungi"
] |
8340c275ac24a40d | Featuring Tonight at the Street Hustler’s Circus: The Girls | Faylita Hicks | The streets ram themselves into coochies:
sodden women with bamboo for backs
& taffy for sex. Both sweet & sour.
Star-cloaked women who don’t bend
or break. Who catch Hondas right in they grills.
Women with electric-pink hoofs that drag
in the slow churn of the intersection. Clog
the sidewalks. Metastasize along... | [
"S3",
"S4",
"S9"
] | [
"S3-1",
"S3-4",
"S4-1",
"S9-4"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Activities"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/Cities & Urban Life",
"Social Commentaries/Gender & Sexuality",
"History & Politics/Money & Economics",
"Activities/Jobs & Working"
] |
6be19fc008ec5e6e | Holy Cross Hospital | Toi Derricotte | couldn't stand to see these new young faces, these
children swollen as myself. my roommate, snotty,
bragging about how she didn't give a damn about the
kid and was going back to her boyfriend and be a
cheerleader in high school. could we ever "go back"?
would our bodies be the same? could we hide among the
ch... | [
"S6"
] | [
"S6-2",
"S6-7"
] | [
"Living"
] | [
"Living/Birth & Infancy",
"Living/Parenthood"
] |
4445f29491f55eb8 | The Winter | Dafydd ap Gwilym | Across North Wales
The snowflakes wander,
A swarm of white bees.
Over the woods
A cold veil lies.
A load of chalk
Bows down the trees.
No undergrowth
Without its wool,
No field unsheeted;
No path is left
Through any field;
On every stump
White flour is milled.
Will someone tell me
What angels lift
Plank... | [
"S2"
] | [
"S2-4",
"S2-7"
] | [
"Nature"
] | [
"Nature/Winter",
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals"
] |
92566c5c58fc705b | The Sonnets: III | Ted Berrigan | Stronger than alcohol, more great than song,
deep in whose reeds great elephants decay,
I, an island, sail, and my shoes toss
on a fragrant evening, fraught with sadness
bristling hate.
It’s true, I weep too much. Dawns break
slow kisses on the eyelids of the sea,
what other men sometimes have thought they’ve se... | [
"S6",
"S10"
] | [
"S10-6"
] | [
"Living",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets"
] |
f6dfc50d0c859df2 | Thanksgiving | Edgar Albert Guest | Gettin’ together to smile an’ rejoice, An’ eatin’ an’ laughin’ with folks of your choice; An’ kissin’ the girls an’ declarin’ that they Are growin’ more beautiful day after day; Chattin’ an’ braggin’ a bit with the men, Buildin’ the old family circle again; Livin’ the wholesome an’ old-fashioned cheer, Just for awhile ... | [
"S8"
] | [
"S8-3",
"S8-5"
] | [
"Relationships"
] | [
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors",
"Relationships/Home Life"
] |
533cc98a9e44689c | In the House of the Latin Professor | B. H. Fairchild | All things fall away: store fronts on the west,
ANGEL’S DELICATESSEN, windows boarded
and laced in day-glow, BLUE KNIGHT AUTO REPAIR
to the north with its verandah of rusted mufflers
and hubcaps of extinct Studebakers.
The diminishing neighborhood sprawls
under dusty folds of sycamore and fading elm,
the high bi... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S8",
"S10"
] | [
"S3-1",
"S8-7",
"S10-8"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Relationships",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Reading & Books",
"Social Commentaries/Cities & Urban Life",
"Relationships/Marriage & Companionship"
] |
53a3b470ecec7c69 | Be Myself | Michael Robbins | I took back the night. Wrested itfrom the Chinese, many of whomwere shorter than me. Two billion outstretched Chinesehands, give or take a fewthousand amputees.A cheap knockoff, the nightproved to be — Noklanot Nokia on the touchscreen.Well, even Old Peng gotta eat,Confucius say. Or maybe thatwas Cassius Clay. In me, ... | [
"S6",
"S10"
] | [
"S10-6"
] | [
"Living",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets"
] |
b7f9b24fd3046444 | Sea Poppies | H. D. | Amber husk fluted with gold, fruit on the sand marked with a rich grain, treasure spilled near the shrub-pines to bleach on the boulders: your stalk has caught root among wet pebbles and drift flung by the sea and grated shells and split conch-shells. Beautiful, wide-spread, fire upon leaf, what meadow yields so fragra... | [
"S2"
] | [
"S2-6",
"S2-8"
] | [
"Nature"
] | [
"Nature/Bodies of Water",
"Nature/Plants & Fungi"
] |
0f1e9c0766dd3625 | For the Fallen | Laurence Binyon | With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.
Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,
There is music in the midst of desolation
... | [
"S3",
"S4",
"S6",
"S11"
] | [
"S3-11",
"S6-4",
"S6-5",
"S11-4"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Living",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Mythology & Folklore/Heroes & Patriotism",
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Living/Mourning"
] |
c5009b941dfa0bab | Ka Waiapo Lani (Heavenly Showers) | Queen Lydia Kamakaeha Lili’uokalani | As if the flow of the watersFrom the triple streams of heavenly showers So the sacred Ao of the eighth heavensWhose flames have scorched the land. Chorus: Should our hearts’ love be restored And our rights be ours once more Then will our sacred beloved shoals of Kane Be the firm foundation... | [
"S3",
"S4"
] | [] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics"
] | [] |
f2173236ef08f585 | The Red Coal | Gerald Stern | Sometimes I sit in my blue chair trying to remember
what it was like in the spring of 1950
before the burning coal entered my life.
I study my red hand under the faucet, the left one
below the grease line consisting of four feminine angels
and one crooked broken masculine one
and the right one lying on top of the... | [
"S6",
"S8",
"S10"
] | [
"S6-1",
"S8-4",
"S10-5",
"S10-6"
] | [
"Living",
"Relationships",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy",
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets",
"Living/Aging",
"Relationships/Friendship"
] |
13d5f7de082ea78b | The Pointless Nether Plow | Will Alexander | It is farming in an inclement sun system
like a powerless nether beast
fallen amidst random stellar debris
fruit changes form
light then quavers across distorted mural relics
the farmer then living as a clarified adder
his land forms compressed
his wheat suspended & flaring
his unstable forms
carving his soil ... | [
"S2",
"S3",
"S9",
"S10"
] | [
"S2-7",
"S3-9",
"S9-4",
"S10-2"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries",
"Activities",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Language & Linguistics",
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Social Commentaries/Rural & Country Life",
"Activities/Jobs & Working"
] |
1005c2a1caf248b6 | Addiction | A. F. Moritz | I wish we could control this revolting
want of control: these people
with their spongy eyes, their mouths
of trembling shoehorns, billhooks for penises
and bear traps for vulvas.
One taste of sunlight and at once
they can’t do without it. Water,
the same, and food, and air,
and a dozen other squalid habits.
So... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S3-2"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/Class & Labor"
] |
c843b625b3501d5d | Narcissist Advice Column | Hinemoana Baker | Pepper blacks the pan so never shake it near me.
Wait for the flagrant animation in my bedroom, in my bed base.
In mountaineering situations sleep swaddled, wake ecstatic
my frantic menus in your mind.
I taste of them all. Refuse to refuse me.
Waste your time on my errands.
Squeeze your lime on my lemons.
Turn u... | [
"S6"
] | [] | [
"Living"
] | [] |
de0a410a257ad3a6 | Conrad Siever | Edgar Lee Masters | Not in that wasted garden Where bodies are drawn into grass That feeds no flocks, and into evergreens That bear no fruit — There where along the shaded walks Vain sighs are heard, And vainer dreams are dreamed Of close communion with departed souls — But here under the apple tree I loved and watched and pruned With gna... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S9"
] | [
"S2-8",
"S9-2"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Activities"
] | [
"Nature/Plants & Fungi",
"Activities/Gardening & Farming"
] |
f736c73e070d46db | Equator Sky, Manila Bay | Joanne Diaz | Here, the brightest constellation is Hydra, the Water Snake, namedfor the half-woman, half-reptile whom Hercules slew with the helpof Iolaus, his charioteer. Imagine the sound of so many heads screaming — the long, shrill bays of an angry woman times twenty — and the smell of birth, of all origins, that follo... | [
"S1",
"S11"
] | [
"S1-1",
"S11-3"
] | [
"Love",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Love/Desire & Erotic Love",
"Mythology & Folklore/Greek & Roman Mythology"
] |
44b237e45b993c7a | The Prophecies of Paracelsus | Nick Lantz | That twig of light, that branch, that
fork, that form.
Beyond that, a city. A horse drowning in
a river, and beyond that, a city. Wildfire, and beyond that,
a city. God, a slippery thing,
an eel, is twined
... | [
"S2",
"S5"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S2-6",
"S5-4"
] | [
"Nature",
"Religion"
] | [
"Nature/Animals",
"Nature/Bodies of Water",
"Religion/God & the Divine"
] |
ce43a5be290cbf50 | memory of water | Reina María Rodríguez | september is a month like any other and unlike any other. it seems in september everything awaited will arrive: in the calm air, in a particular scent, in the stillness of the quay. when september comes, i know i’m going to lose myself. the ants climbing my legs and a certain change of light tell me so. the air comes a... | [
"S1",
"S2",
"S6",
"S9"
] | [
"S1-1",
"S2-3",
"S2-6",
"S9-7"
] | [
"Love",
"Nature",
"Living",
"Activities"
] | [
"Love/Desire & Erotic Love",
"Nature/Fall",
"Nature/Bodies of Water",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
30a39b483f8ae2ca | Fields of Learning | Josephine Miles | When we go out into the fields of learning
We go by a rough route
Marked by colossal statues, Frankenstein's
Monsters, AMPAC and the 704,
AARDVARK, and deoxyribonucleic acid.
They guard the way.
Headless they nod, wink eyeless,
Thoughtless compute, not heartless,
For they figure us, they figure
Our next turnin... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S9",
"S10"
] | [
"S6-3",
"S9-6"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Activities",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Living/Coming of Age",
"Activities/Study & Knowledge"
] |
d4a4fdb1eee797f7 | A Bird, came down the Walk - (359) | Emily Dickinson | A Bird, came down the Walk - He did not know I saw - He bit an Angle Worm in halves And ate the fellow, raw, And then, he drank a Dew From a convenient Grass - And then hopped sidewise to the Wall To let a Beetle pass - He glanced with rapid eyes, That hurried all abroad - They looked like frightened Beads, I t... | [
"S2",
"S6"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S6-4"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living"
] | [
"Nature/Animals",
"Living/Death & Dying"
] |
fdab55577f58a271 | The Man Moves Earth | Cathy Song | The man moves earth to dispel grief. He digs holes the size of cars. In proportion to what is taken what is given multiplies— rain-swollen ponds and dirt mounds rooted with flame-tipped flowers. He carries trees like children struggling to be set down. Trees that have lived out their lives, he cuts and stacks like ... | [
"S1",
"S6",
"S8",
"S9"
] | [
"S1-6",
"S6-5",
"S8-5",
"S8-7",
"S9-4"
] | [
"Love",
"Living",
"Relationships",
"Activities"
] | [
"Love/Realistic & Complicated",
"Living/Mourning",
"Relationships/Home Life",
"Relationships/Marriage & Companionship",
"Activities/Jobs & Working"
] |
eb09dd953e8661d9 | Depression | Charles Reznikoff | So proudly she came into the subway car
all who were not reading their newspapers saw
the head high and the slow tread—
coat wrinkled and her belongings in a paper bag,
face unwashed and the grey hair uncombed;
simple soul, who so early in the morning when only the
poorest go to work,
stood up in the subway ... | [
"S3",
"S4"
] | [
"S4-1"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics"
] | [
"History & Politics/Money & Economics"
] |
684e1a66dd6f874c | Sailing to America | Gregory Djanikian | Alexandria, 1956
The rugs had been rolled up and islands of them
Floated in the centers of every room,
And now, on the bare wood floors,
My sister and I were skimming among them
In the boats we’d made from newspaper,
Sheets of them pinned to each other,
Dhows, gondolas, clippers, arks.
There was a mule outside ... | [
"S6",
"S8",
"S9",
"S10"
] | [
"S8-3",
"S8-5",
"S9-7",
"S10-5"
] | [
"Living",
"Relationships",
"Activities",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors",
"Relationships/Home Life",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
24f6055c7cbb30aa | Little Diary of Getting Old: VIII | Carlo Betocchi | And then at night, when old,
we start having vague pointless
scraps of dreams that lead us
to this place or that, since even
our failing senses insist on
outings: and lost friends reappear,
sleepwalking through the stupor
of surrendered existence.
But here too there’s something
that’s not unconscious, as when
... | [
"S6",
"S7"
] | [
"S6-1",
"S6-4"
] | [
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [
"Living/Aging",
"Living/Death & Dying"
] |
c11583fd7048448e | Weatherman | Chard DeNiord | A cloud spelled out a rune I couldn’t read
fast enough before it morphed into
another form that changed again, so I
recited something true enough from an ancient
book: “The wind blows to the south and turns
to the north; round and round it goes.” The screen
went blank and then the slip. No matter, I thought,
I’l... | [
"S2",
"S9"
] | [
"S2-10",
"S9-4"
] | [
"Nature",
"Activities"
] | [
"Nature/Weather",
"Activities/Jobs & Working"
] |
e796455b6c3120e7 | Prayer for Those on the Staff | Julian Grenfell | Fighting in mud, we turn to Thee, In these dread times of battle, Lord. To keep us safe, if so may be, From shrapnel, snipers, shell, and sword. But not on us, for we are men Of meaner clay, who fight in clay, but on the Staff, the Upper Ten, Depends the issue of the Day. The staff is working with its brains, While we ... | [
"S3",
"S9",
"S11"
] | [
"S3-11",
"S9-4",
"S11-4"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Activities",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Mythology & Folklore/Heroes & Patriotism",
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Activities/Jobs & Working"
] |
cc591df0cbabdd8c | Valentine | Tom Pickard | simplicity
say sleep
or
shall we
shower
have an apple
you are
as I need
water
shall I move?
do you dream?
shallow snow
flesh
melt this | [
"S1",
"S8"
] | [
"S1-1",
"S1-7"
] | [
"Love",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Love/Desire & Erotic Love",
"Love/Romantic Love"
] |
47ee74bdfaf85382 | Black Box | Randall Mann | I was someone's
honor's student once,
a sticker, a star.
I aced Home Ec and Geometry;
I learned to stab a fork,
steer my mother's car.
Old enough to work,
I refreshed the salad bar
at Steak & Ale,
scarcity a line
I couldn't fail.
The summers between university,
interned at AT&T,
in the minority
outreach t... | [
"S6"
] | [] | [
"Living"
] | [] |
c8e014908c62e560 | The Fourth Hour of the Night | Frank Bidart | I Out of scarcity,— | [
"S1",
"S3",
"S4",
"S9"
] | [
"S1-3",
"S3-4",
"S3-11",
"S9-7"
] | [
"Love",
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Activities"
] | [
"Love/Heartache & Loss",
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Social Commentaries/Gender & Sexuality",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
365ed5f6075a6a7c | A Letter to her Husband, absent upon Publick employment | Anne Bradstreet | My head, my heart, mine Eyes, my life, nay more, My joy, my Magazine of earthly store, If two be one, as surely thou and I, How stayest thou there, whilst I at Ipswich lye? So many steps, head from the heart to sever If but a neck, soon should we be together: I like the earth this season, mourn in black, My Sun is gone... | [
"S1"
] | [
"S1-1",
"S1-7",
"S1-8"
] | [
"Love"
] | [
"Love/Desire & Erotic Love",
"Love/Romantic Love",
"Love/Classic Love"
] |
36608a053a3d9adf | Coming and Going | Pierre Martory | As long as you believe in miracles
You watch the sun fall into the sea
Every evening
Then you turn your back and sink
Among the ferns sparkling from a moon or from the other
Night up to your knees under the vault of cries.
The pubescent monkeys, the adolescent pumas
Contemplate the slender crescent
Of the earth... | [
"S6",
"S7"
] | [] | [
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [] |
34c1b5f0b7fb2789 | [Didn’t Sappho say her guts clutched up like this?] | Marilyn Hacker | Didn’t Sappho say her guts clutched up like this?
Before a face suddenly numinous,
her eyes watered, knees melted. Did she lactate
again, milk brought down by a girl’s kiss?
It’s documented torrents are unloosed
by such events as recently produced
not the wish, but the need, to consume, in us,
one pint of Maalox... | [
"S1",
"S8"
] | [
"S1-1",
"S1-4",
"S1-6"
] | [
"Love",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Love/Desire & Erotic Love",
"Love/Infatuation & Crushes",
"Love/Realistic & Complicated"
] |
5e259da045dc1148 | Together | R. S. Thomas | All my life
I was face to face
with her, at meal-times,
by the fire, even
in the ultimate intimacies
of the bed. You could have asked,
then, for information
about her? There was a room
apart she kept herself in,
teasing me by leading me
to its glass door, only
to confront me with
my reflection. I learned fr... | [
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S6-4",
"S8-7"
] | [
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Relationships/Marriage & Companionship"
] |
63d1d0c35d5c8bc2 | Song in a Minor Key | Dorothy Parker | There's a place I know where the birds swing low, And wayward vines go roaming, Where the lilacs nod, and a marble god Is pale, in scented gloaming. And at sunset there comes a lady fair Whose eyes are deep with yearning. By an old, old gate does the lady wait Her own true love's returning. But ... | [
"S1",
"S6",
"S7",
"S8"
] | [
"S1-3",
"S1-7",
"S1-9",
"S8-1"
] | [
"Love",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Love/Heartache & Loss",
"Love/Romantic Love",
"Love/Unrequited Love",
"Relationships/Breakups & Separation"
] |
f3f37b9e93a6262c | Monk's Bird Book | Ed Roberson | Mourning doves are not owls after a while
away from the city not because the country
appears of a softer feather less predatory
you're thinking a sound more naturally friendly
less edgy and dangerous than the subway
but because the
city city to city within itself so sharply
... | [
"S2",
"S3"
] | [
"S2-10",
"S3-1"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries"
] | [
"Nature/Weather",
"Social Commentaries/Cities & Urban Life"
] |
2cc8ab7b4e8d6285 | Rain at Reading | Rachel Wetzsteon | We had gathered under a tent in the parkfor some words before lunch and after separate mornings,and when—twice—the poet said “capital,”the lightning bolts that followed the nounhad me bolting too; I’d always suspectedGod’s communist leanings, but now I regrettedhow few exchanges we knowbetween craft and climate:imagine... | [
"S2",
"S10"
] | [
"S2-10",
"S10-6"
] | [
"Nature",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets",
"Nature/Weather"
] |
fd3ee7b441b9318f | How to Draw a Perfect Circle | Terrance Hayes | I can imitate the spheres of the model’s body, her head,Her mouth, the chin she rests at the bend of her elbowBut nothing tells me how to make the pupils spiralFrom her gaze. Everything the eye sees enters a circle,The world is connected to a circle: breath spools from the nostrilsAnd any love to be open becomes an O. ... | [
"S3",
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"S10"
] | [
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"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets",
"Social Commentaries/Cities & Urban Life",
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Social Commentaries/Race & Ethnicity",
"Living/Mourning"
] |
abf72d9bce8b5995 | The Chant of the Vultures | Edwin Markham | We are circling, glad of the battle: we
joy in the smell of the smoke.
Fight on in the hell of the trenches: we
publish your names with a croak!
Ye will lie in dim heaps when the sunset
blows cold on the reddening sand;
Yet fight, for the dead will have wages—a
death-clutch of dust in the hand.
Y... | [
"S3",
"S4",
"S6"
] | [
"S3-11",
"S6-4"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Living"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Living/Death & Dying"
] |
c513e1ac26fa6ea4 | The God Who Loves You | Carl Dennis | It must be troubling for the god who loves you
To ponder how much happier you’d be today
Had you been able to glimpse your many futures.
It must be painful for him to watch you on Friday evenings
Driving home from the office, content with your week—
Three fine houses sold to deserving families—
Knowing as he does... | [
"S5",
"S8"
] | [
"S8-5"
] | [
"Religion",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Relationships/Home Life"
] |
69716aded73f0ea8 | You left me – Sire – two Legacies – (713) | Emily Dickinson | You left me – Sire – two Legacies –
A Legacy of Love
A Heavenly Father would suffice
Had He the offer of –
You left me Boundaries of Pain –
Capacious as the Sea –
Between Eternity and Time –
Your Consciousness – and me – | [
"S1",
"S8"
] | [
"S1-3",
"S8-1"
] | [
"Love",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Love/Heartache & Loss",
"Relationships/Breakups & Separation"
] |
146dbd21fe5c84c8 | from The Work | Gertrude Stein | Not fierce and tender but sweet. This is our impression of the soldiers. We call our machine Aunt Pauline. Fasten it fat, that is us, we say Aunt Pauline. When we left Paris we had rain. Not snow now nor that in between. We did have snow then. Now we are bold. We are accustomed to it. All the weights are measu... | [
"S3"
] | [
"S3-11"
] | [
"Social Commentaries"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict"
] |
6f8244e788db3cd1 | My Love for Nature | Fatimah Asghar | All this tall grass has ruined my gold
acrylic nails & I know something’s dead
just beyond my window. I grew up
with rats running my floorboards
& know the smell straining from a body
once caught in a trap. In the city
what little I have of an ass
is always out, a simple wind blow
from Marilyn Monroe-ing the st... | [
"S1",
"S2",
"S8",
"S9"
] | [
"S1-6",
"S2-5",
"S2-7",
"S2-8",
"S8-3",
"S9-7"
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"Love",
"Nature",
"Relationships",
"Activities"
] | [
"Love/Realistic & Complicated",
"Nature/Animals",
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Nature/Plants & Fungi",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
c0d1adc4b0d9776b | Attack Underground | Sarah Lindsay | Themiscyra, 72 BC
While Lucullus raided cherry orchards,he left us to besiege, grudgingly, this outlander fortress,named for an Amazon queen,while thinking of food and home.Not one of us has seena single horse-borne warrior woman.Meanwhile, we dug a tomb.We intended it as the tunnelthrough which we’d claim the fort.We... | [
"S2",
"S3",
"S6",
"S11"
] | [
"S2-5",
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"S11-3"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Mythology & Folklore/Greek & Roman Mythology",
"Nature/Animals",
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Living/Death & Dying"
] |
32bc24b0622340ea | Wallpapering | Sue Ellen Thompson | My parents argued over wallpaper. Would stripes make the room look larger? He would measure, cut, and paste; she’d swipe the flaws out with her brush. Once it was properly hung, doubt would set in. Would the floral have been a better choice? Then it would grow until she was certain: it had to go. Divorce terrified me a... | [
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S8-5",
"S8-7"
] | [
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Relationships/Home Life",
"Relationships/Marriage & Companionship"
] |
fed16a76d9d743e1 | To the Quarry and Back | Katia Kapovich | White hail pelting the frozen bog,I’m stuck in the first line of January,following my host’s dogon his walk through the stone century,around the quarry, slices of marble and mud,past a herd of miners exhaling smoke,past a barn smelling of merde,and back to where I’m stuck and broke.The fucking dog barks at the night,ma... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S2-4",
"S2-7",
"S8-8"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Nature/Winter",
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Relationships/Pets & Domestic Animals"
] |
3369be136483e215 | [IT'S BEEN TWO THOUSAND YEARS NOW] | Marie-Claire Bancquart | It's been two thousand years now that, with a wounded leg, the god's amazing loves have dragged along. He has aged. Soon he won't be noticed except from way up in a plane in the markings of wheat that yield the trace of an ancient sanctuary. He solicits a language of caresses, open pasture, available bodies, a... | [
"S5",
"S6",
"S7"
] | [
"S5-3",
"S5-4",
"S5-8",
"S6-1"
] | [
"Religion",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [
"Religion/Faith & Doubt",
"Religion/God & the Divine",
"Religion/The Spiritual",
"Living/Aging"
] |
81fa948413075d32 | To Be Young and in Love in Middle Ireland | Alan Gillis | The girl from the satellitetown holds berries in the fast streamsupermarket queue.She carries her longing like a stream of song,her melodya body over the boundaryof what is solid and what flows.The guys in the depression-hit town are tripping in the fruitaisle. Falling for herberry lightness they slip outfrom their out... | [
"S1",
"S3",
"S6",
"S10"
] | [
"S1-1",
"S1-6",
"S3-1",
"S3-2",
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] | [
"Love",
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Love/Desire & Erotic Love",
"Love/Realistic & Complicated",
"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy",
"Social Commentaries/Cities & Urban Life",
"Social Commentaries/Class & Labor"
] |
f5d0562115e606a4 | Imitations of Horace | Alexander Pope | Ne Rubeam, Pingui donatus Munere (Horace, Epistles II.i.267)
While you, great patron of mankind, sustain The balanc'd world, and open all the main; Your country, chief, in arms abroad defend, At home, with morals, arts, and laws amend; How shall the Muse, from such a monarch steal An hour, and not defraud the public w... | [
"S3",
"S4",
"S10"
] | [] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [] |
abe2027e02f6bacd | Bilbea | Carl Sandburg | (From tablet writing, Babylonian excavations of the 4th millennium B.C.)
Bilbea, I was in Babylon on Saturday night.I saw nothing of you anywhere.I was at the old place and the other girls were there, But no Bilbea.Have you gone to another house? or city?Why don’t you write?I was sorry. I walked home half-sick.Tell me... | [
"S1",
"S3",
"S8"
] | [
"S1-3",
"S3-1"
] | [
"Love",
"Social Commentaries",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Love/Heartache & Loss",
"Social Commentaries/Cities & Urban Life"
] |
2fa4b200326953e8 | The Lowering | May Swenson | The flag is folded
lengthwise, and lengthwise again,
folding toward the open edge,
so that the union of stars on the blue
field remains outward in full view;
a triangular folding is then begun
at the striped end,
by bringing the corner of the folded edge
to the open edge;
the outer point, turned inward along t... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S11"
] | [
"S6-4",
"S6-5",
"S11-4"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Mythology & Folklore/Heroes & Patriotism",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Living/Mourning"
] |
b845878929ba90ee | Indians Never Say Good-bye | LeAnne Howe | There she was standing over me. She inched her face close to my face. She put her hands on my face. I remembered her immediately, but did not speak. My eyes blurred. They were hot and heavy. It hurt to look at Ain’t Sally. It hurt to see.
I closed my eyes. I felt her cool touch. She chanted. “You will be well. Yo... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S3-8",
"S6-6",
"S8-3"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/Race & Ethnicity",
"Living/Health & Illness",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors"
] |
2807613eda81a165 | The Architecture of a Love Poem | Alexandria Peary | Love's balustrade, love's balcony
a few iron words that can be seen anywhere still
in grocery lists, in laundry hung between two objects,
an e-mail, in an apology, in a thought about the weather
these rusty words, these rusting gates
before a breath, Standing in the cold mor... | [
"S1",
"S10"
] | [
"S1-7",
"S10-2",
"S10-6"
] | [
"Love",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Love/Romantic Love",
"Arts & Sciences/Language & Linguistics",
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets"
] |
8d17ac80150b90d1 | The Negative | Tom Sleigh | Back in those days, when he told me about his adventures
in sex clubs it wasn't the whys and wherefores
but technical details, like going rafting
down the Colorado River; and when he wrote
about a gay male friend whose first sexual experience
was with his stepfather, the friend told him
it wasn't weird, but the b... | [
"S5",
"S8"
] | [
"S5-8",
"S8-4",
"S8-6"
] | [
"Religion",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Religion/The Spiritual",
"Relationships/Friendship",
"Relationships/LGBTQ+"
] |
c5c7a5568ac3ee5a | Lycidas | John Milton | Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere, I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude, And with forc'd fingers rude Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year. Bitter constraint and sad occasion dear Compels me to disturb your season due; For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his pri... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S11"
] | [
"S2-7",
"S6-4",
"S6-5",
"S11-3",
"S11-4"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Mythology & Folklore/Greek & Roman Mythology",
"Mythology & Folklore/Heroes & Patriotism",
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Living/Mourning"
] |
40d94adfea1fa2c5 | Queerodactyl | Roy G. Guzmán | Spandex leggings authenticating my anaerobic
exit strategies. Crotch but a bumper sticker
in a heretofore-fleeting waterloo. Crunk repentance. I span
our doomed alphabet soup like Jane Fonda’s antiwar legs
in calisthenic videos. My zenith of hair a brown,
wannabe-Fawcett, mean-ole-toucan pupic ... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S3-4",
"S8-6"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/Gender & Sexuality",
"Relationships/LGBTQ+"
] |
bdaee638f5a9e958 | The Prisoner’s Song | Cedar Sigo | * *
* *
The
third
arrow flew
upward
and stuck
we rode back
sun birds
bedeviled
the great stem
its reflected
words
fas... | [
"S3",
"S4",
"S8"
] | [
"S3-6",
"S3-11",
"S8-3"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Social Commentaries/Incarceration & Justice",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors"
] |
ae8b36bb92cd822e | The Most Expensive | Robin Richardson | Figured marry for money the stainlessness of it
thermostatic shower simulates but isn’t rain
I simulate rain too. I do lines off a photo
of the lunar landing he says is make-believe
I don’t know the difference most of the things
most of the time are as if our Brooklyn Bridge
selfies aren’t faked to goad our favor... | [
"S3",
"S4",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S3-1",
"S3-2",
"S3-4",
"S4-1",
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"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/Cities & Urban Life",
"Social Commentaries/Class & Labor",
"Social Commentaries/Gender & Sexuality",
"History & Politics/Money & Economics",
"Relationships/Marriage & Companionship"
] |
152c13ae35611cba | We dollhouse monsters | Christopher Shannon | dine on disco balls and starfish, our jowls crashing like cymbals, while my baby brother takes out his eight-ballleft eye and squints his right to line up his shot on the world’s smallest pool table.Mother has a camera for a head; it flashes uncontrollably ... | [
"S8"
] | [
"S8-3"
] | [
"Relationships"
] | [
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors"
] |
a67c81fb4d90248e | Hunger Moon | Jane Cooper | The last full moon of February
stalks the fields; barbed wire casts a shadow.
Rising slowly, a beam moved toward the west
stealthily changing position
until now, in the small hours, across the snow
it advances on my pillow
to wake me, not rudely like the sun
but with the cocked gun of silence.
I am alone in a ... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S7"
] | [
"S2-4",
"S2-6"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [
"Nature/Winter",
"Nature/Bodies of Water"
] |
6d119206e282ee83 | Cant | Tyrone Williams | for Thomas Green Bethune
Thar he blows! Plus, tusks
crushed into grins, grins
host to, guest of, impish
Nature, her fort/da “jewels”
glassified behind blank
opposable pupils—Ahabit perfected
(“perhaps memory”) by/for the dicey
Veil. Auto-didact/-dialectics
staged in rent-to-rent
“crowded houses,” asea to har-... | [
"S6",
"S10"
] | [
"S10-2",
"S10-3"
] | [
"Living",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Language & Linguistics",
"Arts & Sciences/Music"
] |
17e6666565596e43 | May You Always be the Darling of Fortune | Jane Miller | March 10th and the snow flees like eloping brides
into rain. The imperceptible change begins
out of an old rage and glistens, chaste, with its new
craving, spring. May your desire always overcome
your need; your story that you have to tell,
enchanting, mutable, may it fill the world
you believe: a sunny view, fl... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S7",
"S8"
] | [
"S2-1",
"S2-10",
"S8-5"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Nature/Spring",
"Nature/Weather",
"Relationships/Home Life"
] |
90c9edcfc9efb469 | Speak | Phillip B. Williams | A storm and so a gift. Its swift approach lifts gravel from the road. A fence is flattened in the course of the storm’s worse attempt at language — thunder’s umbrage. A tree is torn apart, blown upward through a bedroom window. A boy winnows through t... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S10"
] | [
"S2-10",
"S10-5"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy",
"Nature/Weather"
] |
b4147755fbf8027b | The Journey | James Wright | Anghiari is medieval, a sleeve sloping down
A steep hill, suddenly sweeping out
To the edge of a cliff, and dwindling.
But far up the mountain, behind the town,
We too were swept out, out by the wind,
Alone with the Tuscan grass.
Wind had been blowing across the hills
For days, and everything now was graying gol... | [
"S6",
"S8",
"S9"
] | [
"S6-4",
"S8-8",
"S9-7"
] | [
"Living",
"Relationships",
"Activities"
] | [
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Relationships/Pets & Domestic Animals",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
05747c62a6abe163 | Letter to Brooks: Spring Garden | Major Jackson | 1 When you have forgotten (to bring into Play that fragrant morsel of rhetoric, Crisp as autumnal air), when you Have forgotten, say, sunlit corners, brick Full of skyline, rowhomes, smokestacks, Billboards, littered rooftops & wondered What bread wrappers reflect of our hunger... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S8",
"S10"
] | [
"S3-1",
"S8-3",
"S10-5"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Relationships",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy",
"Social Commentaries/Cities & Urban Life",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors"
] |
1c2f73bcdda4a212 | Somewhere between here and Belen | Jay Wright | Somewhere between here and Belen,
the Rio Grande will narrow to a muddy bead,
no more than three feet across from shore to shore.
My friend, Nick Markulis, claims
he loves the river's color there, and will bathe
his toes in the water, and will go on and on
about a dry river in Athens that measures its life
... | [
"S2",
"S8",
"S9"
] | [
"S2-6",
"S8-4",
"S9-7"
] | [
"Nature",
"Relationships",
"Activities"
] | [
"Nature/Bodies of Water",
"Relationships/Friendship",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
128eaf84bff4b1da | Anti-Short Story | Rae Armantrout | A girl is running. Don’t tell me
“She’s running for her bus.”
All that aside! | [
"S10"
] | [
"S10-2"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Language & Linguistics"
] |
228a755aab90b586 | The Precincts of Moonlight | David Wojahn | Her first child belongs to the crows
and his days go circling the yellow-black fields
summers and into the falls. He scans
the horizon, mouth in a sticky O,
like a spirit caged to infinite space.Winged One, she calls, Winged One, come here. Receding,
he pulls off his straw hat and waves, showing his tuft
of obsid... | [
"S6"
] | [
"S6-7"
] | [
"Living"
] | [
"Living/Parenthood"
] |
3a832fba862badeb | Sea Foam Palace | Amy Gerstler | (Bubbling and spumingas if trying to talk underwater, I address you thus:)Must I pretend not to love you (in your present bloom, your present perfection — soul encased in fleshly relevance)so you won’t believe me just another seabed denizen vying for your blessed attention? Some of us (but not you) are so loosely moore... | [
"S2",
"S6"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S2-6"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living"
] | [
"Nature/Animals",
"Nature/Bodies of Water"
] |
f0ca993834d4dae5 | On the Death of Dr. Robert Levet | Samuel Johnson | Condemned to Hope’s delusive mine, As on we toil from day to day, By sudden blasts, or slow decline, Our social comforts drop away. Well tried through many a varying year, See Levet to the grave descend; Officious, innocent, sincere, Of every friendless name the friend. Yet still he fills Affection’s ey... | [
"S6",
"S7"
] | [
"S6-4",
"S6-5"
] | [
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Living/Mourning"
] |
bb1665eb32eceadc | Ode to Big Trend | Terrance Hayes | Pretty soon the Negroes were looking to get paid. My partner, Big Trend, wiped his ox neck and said He wasn't going to wait too much longer. You Know that look your daddy gets before he whups you? That's how Big Trend looked. There was a pink scar Meddling his forehead. Most people assumed a bear Like him couldn't read... | [
"S3",
"S4",
"S8",
"S9"
] | [
"S3-8",
"S4-1",
"S8-4",
"S9-4"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Relationships",
"Activities"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/Race & Ethnicity",
"History & Politics/Money & Economics",
"Relationships/Friendship",
"Activities/Jobs & Working"
] |
d71d7ca866fb7932 | Vlamertinghe: Passing the Chateau | Edmund Blunden | 'And all her silken flanks with garlands drest'— But we are coming to the sacrifice. Must those flowers who are not yet gone West? May those flowers who live with death and lice? This must be the floweriest place That earth allows; the queenly face Of the proud mansion borrows grace for grace Spite of those brute... | [
"S2",
"S3"
] | [
"S2-8",
"S3-11"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries"
] | [
"Nature/Plants & Fungi",
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict"
] |
dcca5fcf2a8e9111 | Muse of Translation | Rebecca Seiferle | “There is no muse of translation,” the translator reminds
as he struggles with Pindar’s victory odes, and what he means
is that the imagery is overwhelming: the hissing of snakes
as Medusa’s sisters mourn her death, the baby Iamos
“lying on a bed of yellow and purple violets,” Heracles
with his baby hands strangli... | [
"S1",
"S8",
"S10"
] | [
"S1-6",
"S8-5",
"S10-2",
"S10-6"
] | [
"Love",
"Relationships",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Love/Realistic & Complicated",
"Arts & Sciences/Language & Linguistics",
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets",
"Relationships/Home Life"
] |
c9e44b37abd97cd9 | Numbered | Tara Bray | The girl was known for shitting in her yard. I did so little for her. She was small, a dandelion orb with ragged hair like an old woman’s burnt from dye. Her face showed little sign of poverty—it was her dusty shoes cut open at the top that told.A bone look she’d mastered young, yet the curve of her face was edible,... | [
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S8-3"
] | [
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors"
] |
bfbffd71ec0e93fc | Daddy | Sylvia Plath | You do not do, you do not do
Any more, black shoe
In which I have lived like a foot
For thirty years, poor and white,
Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.
Daddy, I have had to kill you.
You died before I had time——
Marble-heavy, a bag full of God,
Ghastly statue with one gray toe
Big as a Frisco seal
And a head... | [
"S8",
"S11"
] | [
"S8-3"
] | [
"Relationships",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors"
] |
48751cbec8f0cb7b | The Spirit Is Too Blunt an Instrument | Anne Stevenson | The spirit is too blunt an instrument
to have made this baby.
Nothing so unskilful as human passions
could have managed the intricate
exacting particulars: the tiny
blind bones with their manipulating tendons,
the knee and the knucklebones, the resilient
fine meshings of ganglia and vertebrae,
the chain of the ... | [
"S2",
"S6"
] | [] | [
"Nature",
"Living"
] | [] |
05bc0f846e210ba5 | Eidolon | Roddy Lumsden | Down in fame’s flood, down an alley, downwind of now, elegant in self-denial,an Iron Range wraith junking cue cards, an ideal,an idol before which the Zeitgeist kneeled. Dylan, named for a poet named from an oldtale of the child who crawled to the sea, this landis yours: the black plain the needleploughs from lip to la... | [
"S6",
"S7",
"S10"
] | [
"S10-6"
] | [
"Living",
"Time & Brevity",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets"
] |
82cc355a5c61686f | Nights on Planet Earth | Campbell McGrath | Heaven was originally precisely that: the starry sky, dating back to the earliest Egyptian texts, which include magic spells that enable the soul to be sewn in the body of the great mother, Nut, literally "night," like the seed of a plant, which is also a jewel and a star. The Greek Elysian fields derive from the same ... | [
"S2",
"S3"
] | [
"S2-9",
"S3-1"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries"
] | [
"Nature/Stars, Moons, & Space",
"Social Commentaries/Cities & Urban Life"
] |
7d90104ab1db6a91 | Lava and Sand | Hester Knibbe | The soil I’m walking over comes
from deeper: a fire had done it in,
a stewpot had suddenly popped
and its contents streamed
out wave over wave until
it reached the water, until the sea
called it a day and struck back
with a counterwave. Stony nightblack
dreambarren land where tawny
thyme wrestles up and thistl... | [
"S6"
] | [
"S6-5"
] | [
"Living"
] | [
"Living/Mourning"
] |
ef243f084bab8ef2 | The Approaches | Harry Clifton | A childless, futureless road And then nothing. . . Is that it? Or start believing in a God Beyond the temporal limit Of westering skies, wide, melancholy, Uncut fields and paced-out walls As we drive towards it slowly, The house that has us both in thrall. They are gone, now, the hours of light It took to get here. Mig... | [
"S5",
"S6",
"S10"
] | [
"S10-5"
] | [
"Religion",
"Living",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy"
] |
8705e4786113a4a9 | The Short Answer | John Ashbery | I am forced to sleepwalk much of the time.
We hold on to these old ways, are troubled
sometimes and then the geyser goes away,
time gutted. In and of itself there is
no great roar, force pitted against force that
makes up in time what it loses in speed.
The waterfalls, the canyon, a royal I-told-you-so
comes bac... | [
"S6",
"S7"
] | [] | [
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [] |
1b830410fa8d8e56 | All the Difficult Hours and Minutes | Jane Hirshfield | All the difficult hours and minutes are like salted plums in a jar. Wrinkled, turn steeply into themselves, they mutter something the color of sharkfins to the glass. Just so, calamity turns toward calmness. First the jar holds the umeboshi, then the rice does. | [
"S6",
"S7"
] | [] | [
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [] |
5aeab9d633bf5729 | A Valentine | Robert Graves | The hunter to the husbandmanPays tribute since our love began,And to love-loyalty dedicatesThe phantom kills he meditates.Let me embrace, embracing you,Beauty of other shape and hue,Odd glinting graces of which noneShone more than candle to your sun;Your well-kissed hand was beckoning meIn unfamiliar imagery.Smile your... | [
"S1",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S6-4"
] | [
"Love",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Living/Death & Dying"
] |
cbf02508b0d358c7 | Crosscurrent | M.L. Smoker | For James Welch
The first harvest of wheat in flatlands
along the Milk startled me into thoughts of you
and this place we both remember and also forget as home.
Maybe it was the familiarity or maybe it was my own
need to ask if you have ever regretted leaving.
What bends, what gives?
And have you ever missed thi... | [
"S6",
"S8",
"S9"
] | [
"S8-3",
"S9-7"
] | [
"Living",
"Relationships",
"Activities"
] | [
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
833b54349fb0a3d1 | A Ghost Abandons the Haunted | Katie Cappello | You ignore the way light filters through my cells, the way I have of fading out—still there is a constant tug, a stretching, what is left of me is coming loose. Soon,I will be only crumbs of popcorn, a blue ring in the tub, an empty toilet paper roll, black mold misted on old sponges,strands of hair woven into carpet, ... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S8",
"S11"
] | [
"S6-4",
"S8-5",
"S11-2"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Relationships",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Mythology & Folklore/Ghosts & the Supernatural",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Relationships/Home Life"
] |
41fdea4f9d0e68da | Conversation 23: On Cause | Rosmarie Waldrop | I step into my mother’s room, she says, and though a woman’s body is a calendar of births and injunctions to death, time disappears. Only dead enough to bury could prove sound to silence or the anxiety I know by heart and lung. In my mother’s room. The tie between us anticipates any move to sever it. Terror and lack of... | [
"S6",
"S8",
"S10"
] | [
"S6-4",
"S8-3",
"S10-2"
] | [
"Living",
"Relationships",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Language & Linguistics",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors"
] |
a1bd24e4d50281d7 | Lines to Mr. Hodgson Written on Board the Lisbon Packet | Lord Byron (George Gordon) | Huzza! Hodgson, we are going,
Our embargo's off at last;
Favourable breezes blowing
Bend the canvass o'er the mast.
From aloft the signal's streaming,
Hark! the farewell gun is fir'd;
Women screeching, tars blaspheming,
Tell us that our time's expir'd.
Here's a rascal
Come ... | [
"S2",
"S9"
] | [
"S2-6",
"S9-7"
] | [
"Nature",
"Activities"
] | [
"Nature/Bodies of Water",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
dd7e0491fac1cd98 | Selected Legends of Andre the Giant | W. Todd Kaneko | 13.
After the dinosaurs fell
asleep, after those terrible lizards
began their slow decay into mythology,
Andre the Giant was there to cradle
their bodies in his soft hands and weep.
24.
Andre the Giant wrestled the Earth
into a globe, carved his name into the ocean
floor with his pinky to remind th... | [
"S11"
] | [
"S11-1"
] | [
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Mythology & Folklore/Fairy-tales & Legends"
] |
321a6e647741d00f | A.M. Fog | Mark Jarman | Night’s afterbirth, last dream before waking,
Holding on with dissolving hands,
Out of it came, not a line of old men,
But pairs of headlights, delaying morning.
It felt like tears, like wetted bedsheets,
And suspended in it like a medicine
In vapor was the ocean’s presence, ghost
Of deep water and the bite of s... | [
"S2",
"S5"
] | [
"S2-10"
] | [
"Nature",
"Religion"
] | [
"Nature/Weather"
] |
477b87ac8746db5e | The River of Bees | W. S. Merwin | In a dream I returned to the river of bees
Five orange trees by the bridge and
Beside two mills my house
Into whose courtyard a blindman followed
The goats and stood singing
Of what was older
Soon it will be fifteen years
He was old he will have fallen into his eyes
I took my eyes
A long way to the calendars
... | [
"S6"
] | [
"S6-1",
"S6-4"
] | [
"Living"
] | [
"Living/Aging",
"Living/Death & Dying"
] |
0bce5cf1d3a2d47c | My Grandmother’s Grave | Dunya Mikhail | When my grandmother diedI thought, “She can’t die again.”Everything in her life happened once and forever:her bed on our roof,the battle of good and evil in her tales, her black clothes,her mourning for her daughter who“was killed by headaches,”the rosary beads and her murmur, “Forgive us our sins,”her empty vase from ... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S3-11",
"S6-4",
"S6-5",
"S8-3"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Living/Mourning",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors"
] |
06da5124794d9742 | Animals | Hayan Charara | The phone call, from my wife.She’s hungry, she’s pregnant,someone kicked her
in the stomach—we have to.
I say yes, but the reply
I keep to myself is,
We don’t have to do a goddamn thing.
A dog. I’m talking about a dog
I would have otherwise left to starve.
Now though, five years since,
I love this animal, Lu... | [
"S3",
"S6"
] | [
"S3-11",
"S6-4"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Living/Death & Dying"
] |
31fd764783a2352f | The Playwright’s Daughter | Virginia Keane | I was one year old when my nanny went away
leaving no memory of a face that watched,
arms that held, hands that fed and cleaned me,
left no record of her voice or name. My father
died, leaving wisps of pipe smoke for a memory.
My mother went away to write in London,
left me at her home place, Ballyrankin,
a shel... | [
"S5",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S5-2",
"S6-8",
"S8-3"
] | [
"Religion",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Religion/Christianity",
"Living/Youth",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors"
] |
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