RYOKAN ~

Written In My Hermitage
On A Snowy Evening



For more than seventy years, I have been making

Myself dizzy observing men.

I have abandoned trying to penetrate men's good and bad actions.

Coming and going is a sign of weakness.

Heavy snow in the dead of night —

Under the weather-beaten window, once incense stick.



Light rain — the mountain forest is wrapped in mist.

Slowly the fog changes to clouds and haze.

Along the boundless river bank, many crows.

I walk to a hill overlooking the valley to sit in zazen.



After spending the day begging in town,

I now sit peacefully under a cliff in the evening cool.

Alone, with one robe and one bowl —

The life of a Zen monk is truly the best!



_____________________

Ryokan
One Robe, One Bowl
translated by John Stevens

ADAM ZAGAJEWSKI ~

Mandelstam in Theodosia

Let me go; I wasn't made for jail.

       —OSIP MANDELSTAM

     (arrested in Theodosia in 1920

Mandelstam was not mistaken, he wasn't made

for jail, but jails were made

for him, countless camps and prisons

waited for him patiently, freight trains

and filthy barracks, railroad switches and

gloomy waiting rooms kept waiting

till he came, secret police in leather

jackets waited for him and party

hacks with ruddy faces.

"I will not see the famous Phaedra,"

he wrote. The Black Sea didn't shed 

black tears, pebbles on the shore

tumbled submissively, as the wave desired,

clouds sailed swiftly across the inattentive earth.

July

July, the blackbirds have stopped singing.

I sit on a bench by the bank of a slow river,

I hear the hate-filled quarreling of lovers,

whom I don't know and never will.

Sweaty athletes run along the avenue.

The morning sun shines indifferently

on the calm dark water

that is apathy personified.

A little boy carries a plastic bag

bearing the garish logo Men's Health,

souls almost never meet,

bodies do battle cloaked in darkness.

A rain frail as haiku arrives in the night.

Light bells mumble at dawn.

While we're alive.

Sandals

The sandals I bought many years ago

for twenty eros

in the Greek village of Theologos

on the island of Thassos

haven't work out at all,

they're just like new.

I must have gotten,

quite accidentally,

a hermit's, a saint's sandals.

How they must suffer

carrying an ordinary sinner.

__________________________

ADAM ZAGAJEWSKI

Asymmetry

translated from the Polish

by Clare Cavanagh

Farrar, Straus and Giroux2018

POLISH IMMIGRANTS ~

Polish Immigrants



how do they break away from the land

where even stones take root



how do two languages share one mouth

like two women in one kitchen



how do they bring their bloody bodies

wrapped in accordions instead of bandage

through Security



do new hotels remind them

of boxes of german chocolate



is it true that their pillows

are stuffed with soil

softer than any feather



their faces differ from the locals'

by the number of wrinkles

as if they started

sculpturing something new out of their skin

but then stopped having changed their minds

and never finished their reincarnation



the tiny wrinkles in the corners of their eyes

twisted and shiny from sweat

like bonbon wrappers

but when you look into those eyes

you are looking down the barrel of a gun —

what do you need

in the territory of their city

painted on the wall of the restaurant

Taste of Europe



and there

that very taste

fills your eyes with saliva



————————————

Valzhyna Mort
Factory of Tears
Copper Canyon Press
2008

GROWING UP ~

L I S T E N

City Lights Books

CLIVE FAUST ~

"Light flickers on and off ruffled layers of leaves."

A modest size book of what Clive terms

"Minims, Thoughts, Essayettes

and Mini-Descriptions"

and I leave it to you

to find the many

dozens of excellent

haiku

Shearsman Books

U.K.

2018

HEAVEN LAKE (20) ~

Hair Song

My son’s hair is

More than mine

Longer than mine

Prettier than mine

Not mine but his

Mother’s and mine

I Keep

I keep a small

hatch door I built

in  my work room

ajar to hear my

wife and son talk in

the kitchen where all

the best talking has

always been done

11 Years Old

I see how much

He has grown when

Bending to kiss him

As he sleeps an arm

Out of the covers

Is very very long

Out In The Woods

Young son

waits

patiently

this

summer

with

tele-

scope

for one

more

plane

to fly

over

Needs

In the bakery

dad carries out

a trim white box

of Sunday delicacies

his little daughter

follows, white cap

ignored, holding a

cookie to her nose

—————————————

Bob Arnold

Heaven Lake

Longhouse 2018

TOMI UNGERER ~

1931 ~ 2019

T.U. 

POETS WHO SLEEP by BOB ARNOLD ~

! See !

Bob Arnold's Big Book of Drawn Poets' Portraits

"Poets Who Sleep"

The complete Poets Who Sleep by Bob Arnold

is available as a print limited edition

6" x 8"  ~  perfect bound

576 pages! 

$75
plus shipping

Paypal ~ use our email of poetry@sover.net

_______________

All orders, please inquire :

longhousepoetry@gmail.com

Would you like a Preview PDF? 

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Longhouse, PO Box 2454, West Brattleboro, Vermont 05303

KOON WOON ~ NEW FROM LONGHOUSE 2019 ~

Koon Woon

 I Name You

 Longhouse, 2019

 First edition

New and limited

A Longhouse limited edition

 four page foldout 

with decorative label

Signed by the poet

Poetry

$20

Buy now

with Paypal,

please use our email

poetry@sover.net

Check or money order ~

Longhouse

PO Box 2454

West Brattleboro, Vermont

05303

LI BAI ( LI PO ) ~

R E A D      M E

Pantheon

2019

JOHNNY SHINES (TOO WET TO PLOW) ~

GO ! (TRAIN HOPPING) ~

GEORGES BATAILLE ~

I lose you in the wind

I count you among the dead

a necessary rope

between wind and heart









I have nothing to do with this world

if not to burn

I love you in dying



Your absence of repose

a mad wind whistles in your head

you are sick to have laughed

you fled me for a better void

that tore your heart



Tear me up if you want to

my eyes find you in the night

burning with fever









I'm cold at heart I tremble

from the depths of suffering I call you

with an inhuman cry

as if I gave birth



You strangle me like death

I know this miserably

I find you only in agony

you are beautiful like death



All words strangle me









Star pieces the sky

cry like death

strangle



I don't want life

strangling me is a kindness

the star that rises

is cold like a dead woman









Excite me, eyes

I love the night

my heart is black



Push me into the night

everything is false

I suffer



The world feels death

birds fly eyes slashed open

you are somber as a black sky









The festival will begin

in filth and fear



The stars will fall

when death approaches.









You are the horror of the night

I love you like a death rattle

you are weak like death



I love you like delirium

you know that my head dies

you are the immensity the fear



You are beautiful like slaughter

enormous heart I suffocate

your stomach is naked as the night.









You bring me straight to the end

the agony has begun

I have nothing more to tell you

I speak from the grave

and the dead are silent.








Limpid from head to toe

fragile as the dawn

the wind has shattered the heart



For the duration of anguish

the black night is a church

wherein one slaughters a pig



Trembling from head to toe

fragile as death

agony my great sister



You are colder than the earth.





____________________

Georges Bataille (1897 - 1962 )
The Poetry of Georges Bataille
translated and introduction by Stuart Kendall
SUNY Press / NY 2018