Hospital

Credit: Cor Gaasbeek

Inside or out, the key is pain. It holds

The florist to your pink medicinal rose,

The nickname to the corpse. One wipes it from

Blue German blades or drops it down the drain;

The novelist with a red tube up his nose

Gingerly pets it. Nurse can turn it off.

This is the Oxford of sll sicknesses.

Kings have lain here and fabulous small Jews

And actresses whose legs were always news.

In this black room the painter lost his sight,

The crippled dancer here put down her shoes,

And the scholar's memory broke, like an old clock.

These reached to heaven and inclined their heads

While starchy angels reached them into beds:

These stooped to hell to labor out their time,

Or choked to death in seas of glaucous slime:

All tasted fire and then, their hate annealed,

Ate sad ice-cream, and wept upon a child. 

What church is this, what factory of souls

Makes the bad good and fashions a new nose,

And the doctors reel with Latin and even the dead

Expect the unexpected? For O the souls

Fly back like heavy homing-birds to roost

In long-racked limbs, filling the lonely boughs.

The dead cry life and stagger up the hill;

But is there still the incorrigible city where

The well enjoy their poverty and the young

Worship the gutter? Is Wednesday still alive,

And Tuesday wanting terribly to sin?

Hush, there are many pressing the oak doors,

Saying, "Are boys and girls important fears?

Can you predict the elections by my guts?"

But the rubber gloves are deep in a deep wound,

Stitching a single heart. These far surpass

Themselves, their wives, and the removed goitre;

Are, for the most part, human but unbandaged.

~ Karl Jay Shapiro

A Cut Flower

Credit: David Nuss 

I stand on slenderness all fresh and fair, 

I feel root-firmness in the earth far down, 

I catch in the wind and loose my scent for bees 

That sack my throat for kisses and suck love. 

What is the wind that brings thy body over? 

Wind, I am beautiful and sick.  I long 

For rain that strikes and bites like cold and hurts. 

Be angry, rain, for dew is kind to me 

When I am cool from sleep and take my bath. 

Who softens the sweet earth about my feet? 

Touches my face so often and brings water? 

Where does she go, taller than any sunflower 

Over the grass like birds?  Has she a root? 

These are great animals that kneel to us, 

Sent by the sun perhaps to help us grow. 

I have seen death.  The colors went away, 

The petals grasped at nothing and curled tight. 

Then the whole head fell off and left the sky. 

She tended me and held me by my stalk. 

Yesterday I was well, and then the gleam, 

The thing sharper than frost cut me in half. 

I fainted and was lifted high.  I feel 

Waist-deep in rain.  My face is dry and drawn. 

My beauty leaks into the glass like rain. 

When first I opened to the sun I thought 

My colors would be parched.  Where are my bees? 

Must I die now?  Is this a part of life?

~ Karl Jay Shapiro

A Cut Flower

Credit: David Nuss 

I stand on slenderness all fresh and fair, 

I feel root-firmness in the earth far down, 

I catch in the wind and loose my scent for bees 

That sack my throat for kisses and suck love. 

What is the wind that brings thy body over? 

Wind, I am beautiful and sick.  I long 

For rain that strikes and bites like cold and hurts. 

Be angry, rain, for dew is kind to me 

When I am cool from sleep and take my bath. 

Who softens the sweet earth about my feet? 

Touches my face so often and brings water? 

Where does she go, taller than any sunflower 

Over the grass like birds?  Has she a root? 

These are great animals that kneel to us, 

Sent by the sun perhaps to help us grow. 

I have seen death.  The colors went away, 

The petals grasped at nothing and curled tight. 

Then the whole head fell off and left the sky. 

She tended me and held me by my stalk. 

Yesterday I was well, and then the gleam, 

The thing sharper than frost cut me in half. 

I fainted and was lifted high.  I feel 

Waist-deep in rain.  My face is dry and drawn. 

My beauty leaks into the glass like rain. 

When first I opened to the sun I thought 

My colors would be parched.  Where are my bees? 

Must I die now?  Is this a part of life?

~ Karl Jay Shapiro

Travelogue for Exiles

Source: Skipwall.com 

Look and remember. Look upon this sky;

Look deep and deep into the sea-clean air,

The unconfined, the terminus of prayer.

Speak now and speak into the hallowed dome.

What do you hear? What does the sky reply?

The heavens are taken: this is not your home.

Look and remember. Look upon this sea;

Look down and down into the tireless tide.

What of a life below, a life inside,

A tomb, a cradle in the curly foam?

The waves arise; sea-wind and sea agree

The waters are taken: this is not your home.

Look and remember. Look upon this land,

Far, far across the factories and the grass.

Surely, there, surely they will let you pass.

Speak then and ask the forest and the loam.

What do you hear? What does the land command?

The earth is taken: this is not your home.

~ Karl Jay Shapiro

Travelogue for Exiles

Source: Skipwall.com 

Look and remember. Look upon this sky;

Look deep and deep into the sea-clean air,

The unconfined, the terminus of prayer.

Speak now and speak into the hallowed dome.

What do you hear? What does the sky reply?

The heavens are taken: this is not your home.

Look and remember. Look upon this sea;

Look down and down into the tireless tide.

What of a life below, a life inside,

A tomb, a cradle in the curly foam?

The waves arise; sea-wind and sea agree

The waters are taken: this is not your home.

Look and remember. Look upon this land,

Far, far across the factories and the grass.

Surely, there, surely they will let you pass.

Speak then and ask the forest and the loam.

What do you hear? What does the land command?

The earth is taken: this is not your home.

~ Karl Jay Shapiro