Future Poems
Duino Elegies: The First Elegy
by Rainer Maria Rilke
Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels'
hierarchies? and even if one of them suddenly
pressed me against his heart, I would perish
in the embrace of his stronger existence.
For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror
which we are barely able to endure and are awed
because it serenely disdains to annihilate us.
Each single angel is terrifying.
And so I force myself, swallow and hold back
the surging call of my dark sobbing.
......
The City Planners
by Margaret Atwood
Cruising these residential Sunday
streets in dry August sunlight:
what offends us is
the sanities:
the houses in pedantic rows, the planted
sanitary trees, assert
levelness of surface like a rebuke
to the dent in our car door.
No shouting here, or
shatter of glass; nothing more abrupt
......
Centrifuge
by Dean Young
It might have been midnight when last we talked
and now I've got this poem that keeps flying
apart which accounts under these xenophobic stars
for all force: gravity, magnetism wind, the ling-
ering of a kiss, a judo throw although
there's yet to be a single formula for it.
Save us from single formulas. One room
smells like ash, another smells like fruitcake.
......
The British
by Benjamin Zephaniah
Take some Picts, Celts and Silures
And let them settle,
Then overrun them with Roman conquerors.
Remove the Romans after approximately 400 years
Add lots of Norman French to some
Angles, Saxons, Jutes and Vikings, then stir vigorously.
Mix some hot Chileans, cool Jamaicans, Dominicans,
Trinidadians and Bajans with some Ethiopians, Chinese,
......
The Mystic
by Cale Young Rice
There is a quest that calls me,
In nights when I am lone,
The need to ride where the ways divide
The Known from the Unknown.
I mount what thought is near me
And soon I reach the place,
The tenuous rim where the Seen grows dim
And the Sightless hides its face.
~I have ridden the wind,
......
Listen!
by Michael R. Burch
Listen
by Michael R. Burch
Listen to me now and heed my voice;
I am a madman, alone, screaming in the wilderness,
but listen now.
Listen to me now, and if I say
that black is black, and white is white, and in between lies gray,
I have no choice.
......
Tomorrow's Aquatic Eyes
by Brady Stewart
I find comfort in my future omniscient self in my mind
Viewing this and laughing at my non-reflective verbosity
And recognition of the patterns in my speech and thought
I am an interesting one, at least.
I feel myself removed from my rivers of mind
When I think of the dams that define it
Is the water that I stockpile of importance?
Maybe dams utilize it for power,
Power that other people see as tangible?
Perhaps I will never let the water flow
......
"जंगल की सुरीली ग़ज़ल"
by SANJAY SAHARAN
अजब है ये जंगल की कहानी, जहाँ चुप्पी सुनाती है,
प्राकृतिक रंगों का पैट्रन, एक अनसुनी संगीत।
वृक्ष, प्राचीन कथाकार, जिनकी शाखाएँ आकाश को छू रही हैं,
वायु के साथ नृत्य, समय के लिए एक ओड़े, जहाँ पत्तियाँ राज़ खोलती हैं।
हरे-भरे छायादान में, पृथ्वी साँस लेती है, एक अदृश्य ताल में,
पत्थरों के साथ कहानियों का संगम, और फर्न लगे हैं सपनों की तरह।
गुड़गुड़ाती धारा, एक प्रवाहिनी लोरी, हमेशा मनोहर दृश्य,
......
Up Ahead
by Yareli Rodriguez
The angry voices on the phone,
The messy room in front of me.
If only I was prone
To all the things around me.
The big decisions in the future.
The crazy things in front of me.
If only I had decisive nature,
To have a clear road waiting for me.
......
Dead Tree
by N Jacob
I was sitting under the Sigillaria Tree.
For I have been set free,
So I scream with glee!
While the stitching made me bleed.
I am forced to concede.
Forced my arms to my chest,
And I hold me close with no rest,
For I am trapped in this stitched arm unrest,
I am the court jester.
......
