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After Porfirio Barba Jacob’s Canción De La Vida Profunda Variable, changeable, yes, there are days when people like us are like that. Maybe under some other sky something like glory smiles on us, maybe there life is clear, maybe there things open up on the way the sea stretches out to the horizon— but us, we’re blown by chance the way wind blows blades of grass lightly blowing them all one way. And then there are days when we feel April, the fields of April making us feel our bodies longing to be held and fucked into oblivion, bodies fertile as a field in April, swollen, trembling to be touched: and under the influences of rains pouring down as if pure spirit poured into us like rain, that thing called “soul” sprouts and branches and entangles us in lush bowers and thickets of illusion. Oh yes, days come along when we’re calm, clear —childhood sunsets, lagoons rippling sapphire!— days when a verse, a sudden whistle, days when a mountain and bird passing over it, days when even our own pain and what we feel it to be like make us smile. And sure, there are days when we're so disgusting, so sordid to ourselves it’s like we’re dark stone in the darkness inside flint: then nighttime surprises us, its lamplight dizzying, cold, profuse, glinting off tossed coins of the good, the terrible shining with the gleam of that primal metal. And other days come, come when women want to cry their come cries and use us as their own, days when we’re itching to get a woman naked, and then we can’t face it, can’t stand it somehow, they want us but we don’t know how to want them back: arm tightening around a waist, hand cupping a breast, we don’t dare touch the roundness of an apple or a pear, the round earth spins us off into space. And then there arrive days so dismal and stupefied and numb that the idiot soughing of a pine grove sounds like weeping: and what some idiot called the soul whines and wails and carries on with what some other idiot calls “the pain of the world”: and maybe not God himself, that absolute fool, can make that wind less cutting, or make it stop. And then there comes, certain to come, oh my earth I love beyond any of my days, a day . . . a day . . . a day when my sail catches the wind and drags the anchor up out of the bottom muck, and nothing can withstand that wind blowing by, talking to itself, talking, talking . . . and the day is mine and yours and every living thing’s . . . the day when nobody and nothing can keep us from getting up and going, no matter who we are . . . the day when our leaving is the same as our arriving.

‘out of poverty to begin again’    impoverished of tone of pose that common wealth of parlance   Who so poor the words would   with   and take on substantial meaning   handholds   footholds to dig in one’s heels   sliding hands and heels beyond the residential lots   the plots   it is a poem which may be sung may well be sung

The world is full of loss; bring, wind, my love, my home is where we make our meeting-place, and love whatever I shall touch and read within that face. Lift, wind, my exile from my eyes; peace to look, life to listen and confess, freedom to find to find to find that nakedness.

Ask not the cause why sullen spring So long delays her flow'rs to bear; Why warbling birds forget to sing, And winter storms invert the year? Chloris is gone; and Fate provides To make it spring where she resides. Chloris is gone, the cruel fair; She cast not back a pitying eye: But left her lover in despair, To sigh, to languish, and to die: Ah, how can those fair eyes endure To give the wounds they will not cure! Great god of Love, why hast thou made A face that can all hearts command, That all religions can invade, And change the laws of ev'ry land? Where thou hadst plac'd such pow'r before, Thou shouldst have made her mercy more. When Chloris to the temple comes, Adoring crowds before her fall; She can restore the dead from tombs, And ev'ry life but mine recall. I only am by love design'd To be the victim for mankind.

Amarantha sweet and fair Ah braid no more that shining hair! As my curious hand or eye Hovering round thee let it fly. Let it fly as unconfin’d As its calm ravisher, the wind, Who hath left his darling th’East, To wanton o’er that spicy nest. Ev’ry tress must be confest But neatly tangled at the best; Like a clue of golden thread, Most excellently ravelled. Do not then wind up that light In ribands, and o’er-cloud in night; Like the sun in’s early ray, But shake your head and scatter day. See ’tis broke! Within this grove The bower, and the walks of love, Weary lie we down and rest, And fan each other’s panting breast. Here we’ll strip and cool our fire In cream below, in milk-baths higher: And when all wells are drawn dry, I’ll drink a tear out of thine eye, Which our very joys shall leave That sorrows thus we can deceive; Or our very sorrows weep, That joys so ripe, so little keep.

Come, my Celia, let us prove, While we can, the sports of love; Time will not be ours forever; He at length our good will sever. Spend not then his gifts in vain. Suns that set may rise again; But if once we lose this light, ’Tis with us perpetual night. Why should we defer our joys? Fame and rumor are but toys. Cannot we delude the eyes Of a few poor household spies, Or his easier ears beguile, So removèd by our wile? ’Tis no sin love’s fruit to steal; But the sweet thefts to reveal, To be taken, to be seen, These have crimes accounted been.

Drink to me only with thine eyes, And I will pledge with mine; Or leave a kiss but in the cup, And I’ll not look for wine. The thirst that from the soul doth rise Doth ask a drink divine; But might I of Jove’s nectar sup, I would not change for thine. I sent thee late a rosy wreath, Not so much honouring thee As giving it a hope, that there It could not withered be. But thou thereon didst only breathe, And sent’st it back to me; Since when it grows, and smells, I swear, Not of itself, but thee.

(excerpt) Sweet is the dew that falls betimes, And drops upon the leafy limes; Sweet Hermon's fragrant air: Sweet is the lily's silver bell, And sweet the wakeful tapers smell That watch for early pray'r. Sweet the young nurse with love intense, Which smiles o'er sleeping innocence; Sweet when the lost arrive: Sweet the musician's ardour beats, While his vague mind's in quest of sweets, The choicest flow'rs to hive. Sweeter in all the strains of love, The language of thy turtle dove, Pair'd to thy swelling chord; Sweeter with ev'ry grace endu'd, The glory of thy gratitude, Respir'd unto the Lord. Strong is the horse upon his speed; Strong in pursuit the rapid glede, Which makes at once his game: Strong the tall ostrich on the ground; Strong thro' the turbulent profound Shoots xiphias to his aim. Strong is the lion—like a coal His eye-ball—like a bastion's mole His chest against the foes: Strong, the gier-eagle on his sail, Strong against tide, th' enormous whale Emerges as he goes. But stronger still, in earth and air, And in the sea, the man of pray'r; And far beneath the tide; And in the seat to faith assign'd, Where ask is have, where seek is find, Where knock is open wide. Beauteous the fleet before the gale; Beauteous the multitudes in mail, Rank'd arms and crested heads: Beauteous the garden's umbrage mild, Walk, water, meditated wild, And all the bloomy beds. Beauteous the moon full on the lawn; And beauteous, when the veil's withdrawn, The virgin to her spouse: Beauteous the temple deck'd and fill'd, When to the heav'n of heav'ns they build Their heart-directed vows. Beauteous, yea beauteous more than these, The shepherd king upon his knees, For his momentous trust; With wish of infinite conceit, For man, beast, mute, the small and great, And prostrate dust to dust. Precious the bounteous widow's mite; And precious, for extreme delight, The largess from the churl: Precious the ruby's blushing blaze, And alba's blest imperial rays, And pure cerulean pearl. Precious the penitential tear; And precious is the sigh sincere, Acceptable to God: And precious are the winning flow'rs, In gladsome Israel's feast of bow'rs, Bound on the hallow'd sod. More precious that diviner part Of David, ev'n the Lord's own heart, Great, beautiful, and new: In all things where it was intent, In all extremes, in each event, Proof—answ'ring true to true. Glorious the sun in mid career; Glorious th' assembled fires appear; Glorious the comet's train: Glorious the trumpet and alarm; Glorious th' almighty stretch'd-out arm; Glorious th' enraptur'd main: Glorious the northern lights a-stream; Glorious the song, when God's the theme; Glorious the thunder's roar: Glorious hosanna from the den; Glorious the catholic amen; Glorious the martyr's gore: Glorious—more glorious is the crown Of Him that brought salvation down By meekness, call'd thy Son; Thou that stupendous truth believ'd, And now the matchless deed's achiev'd, Determin'd, dar'd, and done.

(from As You Like It ) Under the greenwood tree Who loves to lie with me, And turn his merry note Unto the sweet bird's throat, Come hither, come hither, come hither: Here shall he see No enemy But winter and rough weather.

My song has put off her adornments. She has no pride of dress and decoration. Ornaments would mar our union; they would come between thee and me; their jingling would drown thy whispers. My poet’s vanity dies in shame before thy sight. O master poet, I have sat down at thy feet. Only let me make my life simple and straight, like a flute of reed for thee to fill with music.