metonymy4u

after a poem by Du Fu

river bank grass and a light breeze
meet beneath mast married to night of one
lone boat, while meanwhile stars
suspended over the endless plaines
moon and her light fallen on river wide
speak of all poetry that brought me fame and growth
while silent my career passed me on
old age and sickness gather for one last round
and i wonder how did i think
my mere mortal image would survive
winds that tear at a lone sand gull caught
between no earth and endless sky

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a thousand sails saw i swimming on the sea
and not one of them a dolphin fin
come to take me on a trip or blend
the waves in a love of all of me.
so i balanced upon the stern of my own home
grown boat and there beheld a sight of thee
that once upon a dusk or midnight clear of love
did dash my dreams upon the shore.
this day you see was not like all the rest–
myself i lost in thine eyes, i took a test
to see if in you beat my own heart of love. tired of that
you tore my open heart from out my chest. in-
        sensate then i sank to troll the ocean floor
        for all i remembered of life above.

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we grow old
our cells senesce,
what stirs
our heart is less
than a cane
in the dark.
of course
one could say
it’s all one
odd hope for
change,
in the mind
of a lonely god.

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too late we learn of all that is dear
and build our boat upon the waves
that toss us to and fro
and take us to our graves.

the day spent as a lie i told you once
was no truth you cannot see
for yourself any time
you walk upon the sea.

and hence i beg you bargain not
with your future oh so dear
the price is cost, silence
is almost a day worn out

in all you held in fear.

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oh dearest love i thank you now
for the authenticity you shared with me,
i thank you for the flowers of your heart.
i thank you for your secret
eternal tenderness.
i thank you too for the vision of your child
and the way you quickly smiled a smile
that wept my heart,
that bound me up in some eternal way
of thought in the kindest eyes
god ever did impart.

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i remember love
the way a river
remembers
mountain snow
waiting for the voice
that will take it
over the falls

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you were the shadow
when i wanted light.
i asked too many questions.
the no you said
didn’t really take me by surprise.
but then how often does it happen
that we tarry under a full grown moon,
knowing it only as it is, loving
only its light?

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a land owned ship
was what i sought
two terms of love of night
two ways to hold them moored.

i could not believe the nature
of the blight i saw there over
hill and under cloud.
i was neither sick nor very proud

of the answer that i gave. slowly your
heart broke me like broken wood
of a small boat tossed
from wave to wave.

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i’m amazed that you accept me anymore
that forests stand
how do you do for any of your love
how command

passions to a lovely end
when paramours become an angry stage
upon which to bend
misanthropic gaze

thus i refute you thus comply
with our kind out of sort
something rare died this morning
unable to comport

what does it take for two to intersect
which one first dares to tread the intervening place
of two lovers arms that crave love
and demise of intersecting space

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                        Sleeping in

Once upon a little time
when the world was white as snow
I tarried in my morning bed
as there was much to do, to know.

I answered God with an angry heart;
he did not know what to say.
I carried his will within my apple
cart, and there it is
to this very day.

O the winds of time worried me not!
I could not really decide the decisions
could not untie the withering knot

this faded blot

that upon my life did lay.
Were they stains in the wind
to show where something was and now
was not?

So once again here and once again there
I’ll go with you, thus
in the morning perhaps
another worded entry will lie with me

for help for love
of break of day.

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