Category Archives: Poetry

Sleep and Poetry

(an excerpt) by John Keats (1795–1821)

What is more gentle than a wind in summer?
What is more soothing than the pretty hummer
That stays one moment in an open flower,
And buzzes cheerily from bower to bower?
What is more tranquil than a musk-rose blowing
In a green island, far from all men’s knowing?
More healthful than the leafiness of dales?
More secret than a nest of nightingales?
More serene than Cordelia’s countenance?
More full of visions than a high romance?
What, but thee Sleep? Soft closer of our eyes!
Low murmurer of tender lullabies!
Light hoverer around our happy pillows!
Wreather of poppy buds, and weeping willows!
Silent entangler of a beauty’s tresses!
Most happy listener! when the morning blesses
Thee for enlivening all the cheerful eyes
That glance so brightly at the new sun-rise.

Let Not Mankind Bogart Love

Willie Nelson in A Colbert Christmas sings of peace on earth. The graphics are excellent, as is his command of the lyrics:

What, no mention of biowillie (biodiesel)?

Feist’s rendition of “Please Be Patient…Due to Increased Prayer Amounts” is aslo amusing, especially the part where she explains that prayers will be taken in the order that they were received. Sadly, she does not reach the lyrical achievement of Nelson, but I think that is because of the format she was given. I wish (not pray, mind you) that Feist had been allowed more of her usual punchy rhythmic upbeat style instead of a syrupy formulaic hymnal, but I suspect Colbert was going for a different style of parody.

El Amenazado / The Threatened One

by Jorge Luis Borges (translated by Katya Rascovsky)

El Amenazado

Es el amor. Tendré que ocultarme o que huir.

Crecen los muros de su cárcel, como en un sueño atroz. La hermosa máscara ha cambiado, pero como siempre es la única. ¿De qué me servirán mis talismanes: el ejercicio de las letras, la vaga erudición, el aprendizaje de las palabras que usó el áspero Norte para cantar sus mares y sus espadas, la serena amistad, las galerías de la Biblioteca, las cosas comunes, los hábitos, el joven amor de mi madre, la sombra militar de mis muertos, la noche intemporal, el sabor del sueño?

Estar contigo o no estar contigo es la medida de mi tiempo.

Ya el cántaro se quiebra sobre la fuente, ya el hombre se levanta a la voz del ave, ya se han oscurecido los que miran por las ventanas, pero la sombra no ha traído la paz.

Es, ya lo sé, el amor: la ansiedad y el alivio de oír tu voz, la espera y la memoria, el horror de vivir en lo sucesivo.

Es el amor con sus mitologías, con sus pequeñas magias inútiles.

Hay una esquina por la que no me atrevo a pasar.

Ya los ejércitos me cercan, las hordas.
(Esta habitación es irreal, ella no la ha visto.)

El nombre de una mujer me delata.

Me duele una mujer en todo el cuerpo.

The Threatened One

It is love. I will have to hide or flee.

The walls of its prison grow, like an atrocious dream. The beautiful mask has changed, but as always it is unique. What purpose will my talismans serve: the exercise of letters, the vague erudition, the learning of words used by the rough North to sing of seas and swords, the serene friendship, the galleries of the Library, the common things, the habits, the young love of my mother, the military shadow of my dead, the intemporal night, the taste of sleep?

Being with you or without you is the measure of my time.

Now the pitcher breaks above the stream, now man rises to the voice of the bird, those who view through the windows have darkened, but shade has not brought peace.

It is, I know, love: the anxiety and relief of hearing your voice, the wait and memory, the horror of living in succession.

It is love with its mythologies, its little useless magic.

There is a corner I do not dare pass.

Now the armies surround me, the hordes.
(This room is unreal; she has not seen it.)

The name of a woman betrays me.

A woman hurts throughout my body.