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The Panther

His vision, from the constantly passing bars,

Has grown so weary that it cannot hold

Anything else. It seems to him there are

A thousand bars; and behind the bars, no world.

As he paces in cramped circles, over and over,

The movement of his powerful soft strides

Is like a ritual dance around a center

In which a mighty will stands paralyzed

Only at times, the curtain of the pupils

Lifts, quietly—. An image enters in,

Rushes down through the tensed, arrested muscles,

Plunges into the heart and is gone.

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Emily Dickinson Poem

The Brain - is wider than the Sky -

For - put them side by side -

The one the other will contain

With ease - and You - beside -

The Brain is deeper than the sea -

For - hold them - Blue to Blue -

The one the other will absorb -

As Sponges - Buckets - do -

The Brain is just the weight of God -

For - Heft them - Pound for Pound -

And they will differ - if they do -

As Syllable from Sound -

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Villanelle for D.G.B. By Marilyn Hacker

Every day our bodies separate,

Exploded torn and dazed.

Not understanding what we celebrate

We grope through languages and hesitate

And touch each other, speechless and amazed;

And every day our bodies separate

Us farther from our planned, deliberate

Ironic lives. I am afraid, disphased,

Not understanding what we celebrate

When our fused limbs and lips communicate

The unlettered power we have raised.

Every day our bodies’ separate

Routines are harder to perpetuate.

In wordless darkness we learn wordless praise,

Not understanding what we celebrate;

Wake to ourselves, exhausted, in the late

Morning as the wind tears off the haze,

Not understanding how we celebrate

Our bodies. Every day we separate.

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In a Station of the Metro by Ezra Pound

The apparition of these faces in the crowd:

Petals on a wet, black bough.

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Alba By Ezra Pound

As cool as the pale wet leaves

Of lily-of-the-valley

She lay beside me in the dawn.