1.

No, no, go not to Lethe, neither twist

       Wolf's-bane, tight-rooted, for its poisonous wine;

Nor suffer thy pale forehead to be kiss'd

       By nightshade, ruby grape of Proserpine;

Make not your rosary of yew-berries,

       Nor let the beetle, nor the death-moth be

               Your mournful Psyche, nor the downy owl

A partner in your sorrow's mysteries;

       For shade to shade will come too drowsily,

               And drown the wakeful anguish of the soul.

2.

But when the melancholy fit shall fall

       Sudden from heaven like a weeping cloud,

That fosters the droop-headed flowers all,

       And hides the green hill in an April shroud;

Then glut thy sorrow on a morning rose,

       Or on the rainbow of the salt sand-wave,

               Or on the wealth of globed peonies;

Or if thy mistress some rich anger shows,

       Emprison her soft hand, and let her rave,

               And feed deep, deep upon her peerless eyes.

3.

She dwells with Beauty—Beauty that must die;

       And Joy, whose hand is ever at his lips

Bidding adieu; and aching Pleasure nigh,

       Turning to poison while the bee-mouth sips:

Ay, in the very temple of Delight

       Veil'd Melancholy has her sovran shrine,

              Though seen of none save him whose strenuous tongue

Can burst Joy's grape against his palate fine;

       His soul shalt taste the sadness of her might,

              And be among her cloudy trophies hung.

Another year is coming to an end
but my old t-shirts will not be back—

the pea-green one from Trinity College,
gunked with streaks of lawnmower grease,

the one with orange bat wings
from Diamond Cavern, Kentucky,

vanished
without a trace.

After a two-day storm I wander the beach
admiring the ocean’s lack of attachment.

I huddle beneath a seashell,
lonely as an exile.

My sadness is the sadness of water fountains.
My sadness is as ordinary as these gulls

importuning for Cheetos or scraps
of peanut butter sandwiches.

Feed them a single crust
and they will never leave you alone.

Do you remember how that glowing morn
We stood hands clasped beside an amber pool
Of lilies pale as your fair skin, and cool
On my brown cheek was the misty breath of dawn?
You said, “We two are friends, for we were born
To dwell at beauty’s shrine. There is no rule
That being brown and fair, we play the fool
’Til friendship flee, a tarnished gleam forlorn.
’Twas then I saw amid the thin-leave grass
The souls of dead men yet to be;
Blue fires, old thrilling hopes leaped and died
When you in dread, a childhood friend espied—
And seeing his slow smile, you shrank from me—
Then,—my faith dead—I turned—and—let—you pass.

^{translated from the Arabic by Fady Joudah}

Each time I hear that word
I recall the disappointments
that were committed in its name:
the children who don’t return,
the ailments that are never cured,
the memory that’s never senile,
all of them hope crushed
beneath its wings as I smash
this mosquito on my daughter’s head.

*

The grieving have only the unknown.
It’s their only staple and inheritance.
Pain has no logic. All things redeem
the grieving except your rational questions.

*

I wish that no one goes
and no one comes.
All going is a stroke of myth
and each return
a punctured lung.

Time drops in decay,
Like a candle burnt out,
And the mountains and the woods
Have their day, have their day;
What one in the rout
Of the fire-born moods
Has fallen away?

Sombre,
Sombre is the night, the stars’ light is dimmed
With smoky exhalations of the earth,
Whose ancient voice is lifted on the wind
In ceaseless elegies and songs of tears.
O earth, I hear thee mourning for thy dead!
Thou art waving the long grass over thy graves;
Murmuring over all thy resting children,
That have run and wandered and gone down
Upon thy bosom.   Thou wilt mourn for him
Who looketh now a moment on these stars,
And in the moving boughs of this dark night
Heareth the murmurous sorrow of thy heart.

                                    Life

I saw the candle brightly burning in the room! 
The fringed curtains gracefully draped back, 
The windows, crystal clear! 
Upon the generous hearth
Quick Wit and bubbling Laughter
    Flashed and danced
    Sparkled and pranced,
And music to the glowing scene lent cheer.
It was a gracious sight, 
So full of life, of love, of light! 

                                    Death 

Then suddenly I saw a cloud of gloom
Take form within the room:
A blue-grey mist obscured the window-panes
And silent fell the rout!
Then from the shadows came the Dreaded Shape,—
The candle flickered out!

Under all beauty that I know,
All vital dreams,
Sharp loveliness,
Under the hair, the lips of laughter,
The dusk-dim eyes of pain,
Lurks the single thing I fear,
Hard-mouthed, implacable-eyed,
The monster,
The satyr-thing, futility.

I cannot look on loveliness
Or burn the flame of ecstasy,
Or even dream for very long,
Without the annihilating fear
That it will suddenly tear some veil
And bare its dreadful face.

When I am light with the exaltation
Mysteriously born of worship,
Filled like a cup with the wine of wonder
At some great cloudy bloom of color,
Or learning the infinite secrets of rapture
With bared heart held to love’s lips—
Light’s eyes are suddenly blinded,
Life gropes in empty twilight,
And the mocking mouth of the satyr-thing
Leers at me from a veil of dust.

Shuddering I crouch to earth,
Trembling lest it come more near,
Trembling lest it stretch a hand
And touch me! Choked by an agony
Of horror lest its deadly eyes
Should shrivel my flaming heart of dream.
Sometimes I think the universe,
Mind, passion, beauty, wisdom, light,
All fathomless life-wonders,
Serve only for its cloak.

It lurks like death in everything
That has a singing heart:
In all exultant voices,
In all desire’s burning eyes,
In youth’s true soul,
In love’s slim hands,

Sometimes I think it is life’s core,
This mocking-mouth’d implacable ghost.
Sometimes I think it is life’s core.
Sometimes I think it must be God.

Let me tell you about suffering
because I was a boy cold without love
in a large house, so dark it stifled laughs.
I would run to my mother with stones
only to drop them under a grim gaze
so harsh I felt tossed in a freezing bath.
Her words, like a cicada's shrill chirp, pierced
the long summer afternoons of my hopes.
I can still remember my brother's folded hands
in the coffin, how kissing them burnt me.
I cried uncontrollably, torched inside
with processional fires held by shadowed monks
cowled in their black walk through narrow streets
of my town, terrifying my heart forever.

                         Delirious,
touch-starved,
             I pinch a mole
                          on my skin, pull it
off, like a bead—
             I pinch & pull until
                          I am holding
a black rosary. Prayer
             will not cool
                          my fever.
Prayer will not
             melt my belly fat,
                         will not thin
my thighs.

                         A copper-
faced man once
             called me beautiful.
                         Stupid,
stupid man.
             I am obese. I am
                         worthless.
I can still feel
             his thumb—
                          warm,
burled—moving
             in my mouth.
                          His thumbnail
a flake

                          of sugar
he would not
             allow me to swallow.
                          Desperate
for the sting of snow
             on my skin,
                          rosary
tight in my fist,
              I walk into
                          a closet, crawl
into a wedding dress.
                         Oh Lord,
here I am.