If There Is Something to Desire: One Hundred Poems Paperback - 2012

Excerpt

7

If there is something to desire,
there will be something to regret.
If there is something to regret,
there will be something to recall.
If there is something to recall,
there was nothing to regret.
If there was nothing to regret,
there was nothing to desire.



9

I broke your heart.
Now barefoot I tread
on shards.

11

Let us touch each other
while we still have hands,
palms, forearms, elbows . . .
Let us love each other for misery,
let us torture each other,
mangle, maim,
to remember better,
to part with less pain.

16

Whose face and body would I like to have?
The face and body of Nike.
I would fly past all those Venuses,
would have nothing to do with Apollos.
With the wind chilling my shoulder
I would leave behind forever
the hall of plaster copies!

71

Self-Portrait in Profile

I
am
the one
who wakes up
on your
left.

76

Am I lovely? Of course!
Breathlessly I taste
the subtle compliment
of a handmade caress.
Chop me into tiny bits,
caress and tame my soul,
that godly swallow
you love to no end.

78

Basked in the sun,
listened to birds,
licked off raindrops,
and only in flight
the leaf saw the tree
and grasped
what it had been.

91

dropped
and falling
from such
heights
for so
long
that
maybe
I will have
enough time
to learn
flying


From the Hardcover edition.