Calaidescope World

Poetry For A Rainy Day

When Tori Amos released her Strange Little Girls album in 2001, the CD came with prose by Neil Gaiman (click on the link to go straight to the Strange Days page of Tori Amos's webpage). New Age, Strange Little Girl, I'm Not In Love and Real Men are my favorites. It's good reading, rain or shine (rain is better. Listen to the album while you're at it).

A few other rainy day poems - one by Anne Sexton, a couple by me (from 2005), and another by Margaret Atwood. No Sylvia Plath today or Anne Sexton's Wanting To Die, although methinks it's time to bring out the Magnetic Poetry kit. As Shirley Manson once sang, some of us are only happy when it rains.


"Words" - Anne Sexton

Be careful of words,
even the miraculous ones.
For the miraculous ones we do our best,
sometimes they swarm like insects
and leave not a sting but a kiss.
They can be good as fingers.
They can be trusty as the rock
you stick your bottom on.
But they can be both daisies and bruises.

Yet I am in love with words.
They are doves falling out of the ceiling.
They are six holy oranges sitting in my lap.
They are the trees, the legs of summer,
and the sun, its passionate face.

Yet often they fail me.
I have so much I want to say,
so many stories, images, proverbs, etc.
But the words aren't good enough,
the wrong ones kiss me.
Sometimes I fly like an eagle
but with the wings of a wren.

But I try to take care
and be gentle to them.
Words and eggs must be handled with care.
Once broken they are impossible
things to repair.


"That Boy"

He came, he went.
He helped me pass the time.
And when we lost the hours of night,
Well...
I guess even not-so-happy endings
turn out right.


"Let Her Go"

And he said, "When the stars have fallen
from the sky, our hearts will collide. I'll
pick up the pieces with my bloody hands.
How far would you have walked away from
me by then?"


"This Is A Photograph Of Me" - Margaret Atwood

It was taken some time ago.
At first it seems to be
a smeared
print: blurred lines and grey flecks
blended with the paper;

then, as you scan
it, you see in the left-hand corner
a thing that is like a branch: part of a tree
(balsam or spruce) emerging
and, to the right, halfway up
what ought to be a gentle
slope, a small frame house.

In the background there is a lake,
and beyond that, some low hills.

(The photograph was taken
the day after I drowned.

I am in the lake, in the center
of the picture, just under the surface.

It is difficult to say
where precisely, or to say
how large or small I am:
the effect of water
on light is a distortion.

but if you look long enough,
eventually
you will see me.)

*Photo of Woman in Grief - one of my favorite exhibit pieces from the National Museum in New Delhi, India. It's actually much smaller than how you see it on this post. If you blink as you walk along the exhibit wall, you'll miss it.

posted by Calai @ 12:59 PM