there’s an ecstasy
all hard like shells
you can hold them in your palm.
In the sea caves
for whole days I gazed into your eyes
and I didn’t know you nor did you know me.
Untitled poem drawn from the Book of Exercises. All translations by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard
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On the secret seashore
we thirsted at noon;but the water was brackish.On the golden sandwe wrote her name;but the sea-breeze blewand the writing vanished.With what spirit, what heart,what desire and passionwe lived our life: a mistake!So we changed our life.
We were happy all that morning
First the stones the leaves and the flowers shoneand then the suna huge sun all thorns but so very high in the heavens.Α Nymph was gathering our cares and hanging them on the treesa forest of Judas trees.Cupids and satyrs were singing and playingand rosy limbs could be glimpsed amid black laurelthe flesh of young…
Whether it’s dusk
the jasmin staysalways white.
All morning long we looked around the citadel*
green and without luster—breast of a slain peacock—received us like time without an opening in it.Veins of rock dropped down from high above,twisted vines, naked, many-branched, coming aliveat the water’s touch, while the eye following themstruggled to escape the tiresome rocking,losing strength continually.On the sunny side a long empty beachand the light striking diamonds on…
The day was cloudy. No one could come to a decision;
A few slender cypresses nailed to the slope, and, beyond, the seagrey with shining pools.The soldiers presented arms as it began to drizzle.‘Not a north-easter, the sirocco,’ was the only decision heard.And yet we knew that by the following dawnnothing would be left to us, neither the woman drinking sleep at our sidenor the memory…
Again with spring
and with gentle stepsagain with springagain in summershe was smiling.Among fresh blossomsbreast naked to the veinsbeyond the dry nightbeyond the white old mendebating quietlywhether it would be betterto give up the keysor to pull the ropeand hang from the nooseto leave empty bodiesthere where souls couldn’t endurethere where the mind couldn’t catch upand knees buckled.With…