Explore Poems: Death

On my way to the fertility clinic,
         I pass five dead animals.

First a raccoon with all four paws…

                                      PRIMEAt dawn, the shapes of cypresses in fog
Were fingers pointing up from graves, as if what's born…

See’st thou yon gray gleaming hall,
Where the deep elm-shadows fall?
Voices that have left the earth
  …

                                              I

What shall I do with this absurdity —
O heart, O troubled heart — this caricature,
Decrepit age that...

When you looked up and said, “Thank you,” I saw
your gratitude rise over us like rain.
It seemed external…

Of all the times I wished you would die quick,
my despair ballooning like a cartoon
bubble (but kept…

Midnight has come and the great Christ Church bellAnd many a lesser bell sound through the room;And …

I get good at pretending
that I don’t blame you
for his death, and this is all
it takes to keep you…

I did not know it was possible (your constancy
being among your chief characteristics)

and I, bereft…

I used to think
there was only one of  You
before the miscarriage.
Now, I am not so sure.
Maybe there are…

Between us, there are one hundred one
umber haints in our home.

In bed, we discuss
our future, our children…

a man is killed in Mobile, Alabama. It is 1981, nearest what some will call the last lynching in America…

From within my bodily singularity
I play at sending out gentle sunbeams.
I don't believe in myself, but…

Morning thick with inscrutable dinge;
another season drained. I’m watching
the pest control man fill the rat bait
station, black attaché of poison hidden
in the hedge.
                And while I pay a monthly
bill for him to do my killing, still
it seems miraculous, how much insists
on...

Let’s try this:
If you’re dead, blink twice
I promise the second time will be incredible

Hagamos algo:
Si estás muerto parpadea 2 veces
Te prometo que la segunda vez será increíble

Brother, this morning was full of movement, sun flooding
the windows and dew on every green thing. The clouds

slow motion behind the screen of leaves. I wish you
could see the treetops starting to turn into flames.

I wish you could see the...

Death no wild thing
and you a boy,
Max.

One night in your room
(or body)
a forest grew

and the walls
(or cells) became
transparent

because brightness
invites
transparency, I guess.

Then a little boat
to hospital smells.
Doctors called

the forest cancer,
not obscuring leaves.
And you a boy.

You say:
“Why can’t people use the word
courage

instead...

How horrible it is, how horrible
that Cronenberg film where Goldblum’s trapped

with a fly inside his Material
Transformer: bits of the man emerging

gooey, many-eyed; bits of the fly
worrying that his agent’s screwed him—

I almost flinch to see the body later
that’s left its...

It’s New Year’s.
It’s New Year’s & the stars are white-hot & all your favorite dishes
are flushed warm on the island: tteokguk for fortune, knife-cut noodles
for longevity, persimmon pudding & a tin can of sardines.
The nectarines are in season in our...