EPITAPH (TRANSLATION)
IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM
After many pleasant sports
With my companions,
I, who sprang from earth,
Am now to earth returned.
Arthur Hough Clough
"Say Not the Struggle
Naught Availeth"
The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250 -1900.
Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919.
http://bartelby.org/101/741.html
Say not
the Struggle
Naught availeth
Arthur Hugh Clough.
(1819 - 1861)
SAY not the struggle naught availeth,
The labour and the wounds are vain,
The enemy faints not, nor faileth,
And as things have been they remain.
If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;
It may be, in yon smoke conceal'd,
Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers,
And, but for you, possess the field.
For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,
Seem here no painful inch to gain,
Far back, through creeks and inlets making,
Comes silent, flooding in, the main.
And not by eastern windows only,
When daylight comes, comes in the light;
In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly!
But westward, look, the land is bright!
Sudeep
Sen
"PRAYER FLAG"
Om, Mani Padme Hum
O, the Jewel in the Lotus
-- inscription on a Tibetan prayer flag
1. MANAS SAROVAR, MT. KKAILASH
Frayed, flapping in the high winds --
prayer flags unravel --
homage to the day's first light.
But today, the dawn is not as bright,
though heavy, brooding, silver-grey
like the lake's shimmering glass-top.
No one is here, except for a woman
staring far away,
wrapped in her sanctity
of continuous linen -- her own sari
like a prayer flag --
though devoid of any colour.
She isn't mourning or crying,
just gazing fixedly
into the water's changing glimmer.
as the sky's wet weight
and the shore's rocky line meet,
their edges meanderingly
melting into the lake itself.
I stood far behind her,
behind everything she saw.
Sudeep Sen
"Offering"
from prayer flag [cd]
(Leeds, Peepal Press, 2003)
also published as "Offering, fluids" in
RAIN (India:MapinLit) 2005
(London:MapinLit) 2006
www.sudeepsen.net
Offering, fluids
Sudeep Sen
the kindess of libation, lyric, and blood.
her endless notes left for me -
little secrets, graces --
trills recorded on blue and purple parchment
to be lipped, tasted, devoured--
only the essence remains--
its stickiness, its juice, its memory --
seamless juxtaposition --
the brute and the passion,
dry of bone
and wet of the sea,
coarseness of the page and smooth of the nib's iridium --
I try and trace a line, a very long line --
the ink blots
as this line's
linear edges
dissolves and fray --
like capillary threads
gone mad,
twirling in
the deep heat of the tropics --
threads unraveling,
each sinew tense with the want of moisture
and the other's flesh --
there are no endings here --
only beginnings- -
precious
incipience --
transclucent drops of sweat
perched precariously on her collar-bone
waiting to slide,
roll unannounced into the gulleys
that yearn to soak in the rain --
heartbeat shift
the shape of globules
as they alter
their balance and colour,
changing their very point of gravity --
constantly deceiving the other
I stand, wanting --
wanting more of the bone's dry edge,
the infinite blur of desire,
the dream,
the wet, the salt, the ink,
and
the underside of her skin
Patsy
Futatsugi
After the War
West Euston Purple Poet
written 22.07.2006
First performed at the Cumberland Market
Festival,
Cumberland Market, West Euston, London
at 2 p.m. on the Main Stage
on July 29, 2006.
After the War
by Patsy Futatsugi
My mother worked in a sweet shop
And every Friday she brought me
My special treat. Fuller's Chocolates.
Round with bits of purple and red
Square nougat, sugared almonds
Walnuts covered in Dark and Milk
Chocolate. They were just there
Every Friday when she was paid.
One Friday my mother forgot
I remember screaming
Kicking and crying
"Where's my bloody chocolates"
And being put to bed without supper.
The next Friday she came home
With more glossy, shiny,
Gooey chocolates.
Glossy, shiny, creamy,
Milky, syrupy-sweet
Smearing on the hands and face
Of a five year old
Melting in my mouth.
Richard
Price
Big Bang research
From Lucky Day
(Manchester: Carcanet Press 2005)
Big
Bang research
by Richard Price
I know them by their poems,
attachments that can't be read.
"It's just finished. Not really.
Is that last line way too much?"
Then I'm tap tapping,
saying, "Visits
are my favourite poems.
Come and stay... the week?"
Letters arrive, less.
Could paper be made from leaves?
Autumn's over. We're binary
but we're not digits -
I hear attachments, attachments
are an accident
of big bang research.
The upgrade (you know
this new upgrade?) -
the upgrade
will read everything.
Kim
Morrissey
Lives of the Poets: Poets in Residence
First read at the London launch
of Atlas Magazine (edited by Sudeep Sen)
Lauderdale House, July 8th 2006,
Highgate, London
Lives
of the Poets: Writers-in-Residence
by Kim Morrissey
The problem with artists as house-guests
Is they don't go away.
You can't fold them up in a suitcase
And take them down to the station.
They arrive with one bag or two
And leave with three more of yours
And take you with them
To carry their luggage
And broken trolleys.
All artists have bad backs.
So do I.
The problem with artists as house-guests
Is they expect you to listen to their rants
Over breakfast, through your favourite play,
At three in the morning when they
Come into your room with tequila and salt
And bounce on your bed.
The only time they are silent
They are tongue-kissing your lover.
The problem with artists as house-guests
Is they are all larger than life
And spend most of it trying to end it .
I have nothing to live for
Just let me die. Oh please, please,
I'd be better off dead
Until you agree.
Or they cry because they can't have children
With you.
The problem with artists as house-guests
Is when they sleep, they burn your carpet
Or their beards or set fire to your bed
Dropping lit cigarettes .
Artists as house-guests need feeding
Three times an hour
If you leave them any longer
You find them hungrily
Eyeing the baby.
They all cook either badly or well, but they all
Cook using every pot in the house. They drop
Fag ashes beating eggs for the omelettes
And roll joints for your mother
And after they wash up
All your non-stick pans
Stick.
They spend all your money.
And the damn thing of it is:
The problem with artists as house-guests
Is that when, eventually, they go away
You miss them.
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