The bees build in the crevices
Of loosening masonry, and there
The mother birds bring grubs and flies.
My wall is loosening; honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

We are closed in, and the key is turned
On our uncertainty; somewhere
A man is killed, or a house burned.
Yet no clear fact to be discerned:
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

A barricade of stone or of wood;
Some fourteen days of civil war:
Last night they trundled down the road
That dead young soldier in his blood:
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

We had fed the heart on fantasies,
The heart's grown brutal from the fare,
More substance in our enmities
Than in our love; O honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

My cucumber grows
for a lovely ***,
fellow cumbers, trained,
put in rows,
cooling pinch
of old man habanero.
Cuz she is hotter than he,
in this summer heat,
so widespread her angle--
raising beans a'dangle,
as zucchini and I do wrangle,
for he has a large leaf,
but I have a long vine,
tho his girth could cover me,
I could climb higher inside,
to get to my lovely ***,
and she does not like grubs,
unearthed during their rubs,
for she told me so,

Oh my lovely ***,
*** me up, and bat me hard,
send my cucumber seeds
sailing over the neighbors yard.

i am an animal— should I not delight in this?
Should I not celebrate
                                  bare skin and bared teeth?
Should I not
dance
barefoot in the light of the moon, jubilating in all that I am?

I praise this body that moves me— from the too rough soles of my feet, the hungry churn of my stomach, the burn between my legs. I give thanks to broken skim and bruises; these are the evidence of my life force.

I sit in a Labyrinth, a holy place where my brother & sister stones give me solemn council.
I feel life.
I smell it, I hear it, I taste it on cold air.
Life energies flitting all around me. I soak it up as my skin drinks the sun.

Am I thankful for life in this place?
                                                        No.
But I am happy to greet it. I accept its presence for another day and I move with it, dancing and contorting as I ought. I stretch my muscles and fill my lungs.
And in this moment I feel no fear.

When you do not fear Death how can you fear Life?
How can I fear anything in this life when death—full of the unknowing dark, full of the unblinking darkness, full of that which is unspoken— is known as a friend?

When you welcome death into yourself, you gain and lose life simultaneously.
While you see the day in a different light— more pure, calmer, brighter that you ever could have imagined— this light you are observing doesn’t really
reach you. It doesn’t
wash nor warm you as it
                                          once
                                                     did.
Everything
becomes Colder.
Everything becomes colder, but the cold doesn’t hurt
quite
          as
much.
It’s there, but distant— ebbing at the edges of my nerve endings, but my body doesn’t dispel it nor does it coil away, spitting. Rather, it embraces it. Grows little white flowers in its dark shade and growls merrily from the frozen ground.
        
Let Winter come
and let it awaken the dead-tree creature living within me, somewhere between my
spine
and
my
rib-bones.
Let the cold douse the fire and let that which is pale and hungry roam. Let it breathe its own fire amid the skeletons of Elms and Pine. Let this feverish animal breathe steam into the night air. Let it roam, choking and coughing on a too hot stomach {too much burbon and hot chemical fire}. Let it run itself back into the ground, squirming with the grubs and the centipedes, blind and snuffling, frantic.

You cannot cage your own animal nature.
It will only grow Wilder there. Wilder and hateful— it will turn on that which tried to lock it away. Let it live free, by Bone and by Fire, by Water and by Stone— let it come Alive.

Something made of teeth lives there, breathing shakily, bleeding and slithering in the dark we all try to put away from the light of social normality. Something anthropomorphic and angry. You can’t hide away that which is within you. Maybe it lives at the center of the Labyrinth, waiting on you to stumble upon it. Maybe it only lives at the Labyrinth’s edges— skittering around  outside walls, keeping you fighting within it.
You could drown this creature with bourbon and whiskey, but it will only laugh and dance out of your throat. You could stab this animal, but it will only bleed ink and raven feathers. Ink from words left unwritten and thoughts unsaid.
            I am the snake, the bird, the cat, the wasp, the human.
        The Animal.
I am the mother, the daughter, the grandmother.
                            I am Alive.
There is power in the bones.
May mine rattle in the hollow night, may mine howl, hungry at the moon. May I crave blood, may I hunger for its life as my body hungers for sustenance.

This is my modern English translation of Paul Valéry's poem “Le cimetière marin” (“The graveyard by the sea”). Valéry was buried in the seaside cemetery evoked in his best-known poem. From the vantage of the cemetery, the tombs seemed to “support” a sea-ceiling dotted with white sails. Valéry begins and ends his poem with this image ...

Excerpts from “Le cimetière marin” (“The graveyard by the sea”)
from Charmes ou poèmes (1922)
by Paul Valéry
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Do not, O my soul, aspire to immortal life, but exhaust what is possible.
—Pindar, Pythian Ode 3

1.
This tranquil ceiling, where white doves are sailing,
stands propped between tall pines and foundational tombs,
as the noonday sun composes, with its flames,
sea-waves forever forming and reforming ...
O, what a boon, when some lapsed thought expires,
to reflect on the placid face of Eternity!

5.
As a pear dissolves in the act of being eaten,
transformed, through sudden absence, to delight
relinquishing its shape within our mouths,
even so, I breathe in vapors I’ll become,
as the sea rejoices and its shores enlarge,
fed by lost souls devoured; more are rumored.

6.
Beautiful sky, my true-blue sky, ’tis I
who alters! Pride and indolence possessed me,
yet, somehow, I possessed real potency ...
But now I yield to your ephemeral vapors
as my shadow steals through stations of the dead;
its delicate silhouette crook-*******, “Forward!”

8.
... My soul still awaits reports of its nothingness ...

9.
... What corpse compels me forward, to no end?
What empty skull commends these strange bone-heaps?
A star broods over everything I lost ...

10.
... Here where so much antique marble
shudders over so many shadows,
the faithful sea slumbers ...

11.
... Watchful dog ...
Keep far from these peaceful tombs
the prudent doves, all impossible dreams,
the angels’ curious eyes ...

12.
... The brittle insect scratches out existence ...
... Life is enlarged by its lust for absence ...
... The bitterness of death is sweet and the mind clarified.

13.
... The dead do well here, secured here in this earth ...
... I am what mutates secretly in you ...

14.
I alone can express your apprehensions!
My penitence, my doubts, my limitations,
are fatal flaws in your exquisite diamond ...
But here in their marble-encumbered infinite night
a formless people sleeping at the roots of trees
have slowly adopted your cause ...

15.
... Where, now, are the kindly words of the loving dead? ...
... Now grubs consume, where tears were once composed ...

16.
... Everything dies, returns to earth, gets recycled ...

17.
And what of you, great Soul, do you still dream
there’s something truer than these deceitful colors:
each flash of golden surf on eyes of flesh?
Will you still sing, when you’re as light as air?
Everything perishes and has no presence!
I am not immune; Divine Impatience dies!

18.
Emaciate consolation, Immortality,
grotesquely clothed in your black and gold habit,
transfiguring death into some Madonna’s breast,
your pious ruse and cultivated lie:
who does not know and who does not reject
your empty skull and pandemonic laughter?

24.
The wind is rising! ... We must yet strive to live!
The immense sky opens and closes my book!
Waves surge through shell-shocked rocks, reeking spray!
O, fly, fly away, my sun-bedazzled pages!
Break, breakers! Break joyfully as you threaten to shatter
this tranquil ceiling where white doves are sailing!

*

“Le vent se lève! . . . il faut tenter de vivre!
L'air immense ouvre et referme mon livre,
La vague en poudre ose jaillir des rocs!
Envolez-vous, pages tout éblouies!
Rompez, vagues! Rompez d'eaux réjouies
Ce toit tranquille où picoraient des focs!”



PAUL VALERY TRANSLATION: “SECRET ODE”

“Secret Ode” is a poem by the French poet Paul Valéry about collapsing after a vigorous dance, watching the sun set, and seeing the immensity of the night sky as the stars begin to appear.

Ode secrète (“Secret Ode”)
by Paul Valéry
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

The fall so exquisite, the ending so soft,
the struggle’s abandonment so delightful:
depositing the glistening body
on a bed of moss, after the dance!

Who has ever seen such a glow
illuminate a triumph
as these sun-brightened beads
crowning a sweat-drenched forehead!

Here, touched by the dusk's last light,
this body that achieved so much
by dancing and outdoing Hercules
now mimics the drooping rose-clumps!

Sleep then, our all-conquering hero,
come so soon to this tragic end,
for now the many-headed Hydra
reveals its Infiniteness …

Behold what Bull, what Bear, what Hound,
what Visions of limitless Conquests
beyond the boundaries of Time
the soul imposes on formless Space!

This is the supreme end, this glittering Light
beyond the control of mere monsters and gods,
as it gloriously reveals
the matchless immensity of the heavens!

This is Paul Valery’s bio from the Academy of American Poets:

Paul Valéry
(1871–1945)

Poet, essayist, and thinker Paul Ambroise Valéry was born in the Mediterranean town of Séte, France, on October 30, 1871. He attended the lycée at Montpellier and studied law at the University of Montpellier. Valéry left school early to move to Paris and pursue a life as a poet. In Paris, he was a regular member of Stéphane Mallarmé's Tuesday evening salons. It was at this time that he began to publish poems in avant-garde journals.

In 1892, while visiting relatives in Genoa, Valéry underwent a stark personal transformation. During a violent thunderstorm, he determined that he must free himself "at no matter what cost, from those falsehoods: literature and sentiment." He devoted the next twenty years to studying mathematics, philosophy, and language. From 1892 until 1912, he wrote no poetry. He did begin, however, to keep his ideas and notes in a series of journals, which were published in twenty-nine volumes in 1945. He also wrote essays and the book "La Soirée avec M. *****" ("The Evening with Monsieur *****," 1896).

Valéry supported himself during this period first with a job in the War Department, and then as a secretary at the Havas newspaper agency. This job required him to work only a few hours per day, and he spent the rest of his time pursuing his own ideas. He married Jeannie Gobillard in 1900, and they had one son and one daughter. In 1912 Andre Gide persuaded Valéry to collect and revise his earlier poems. In 1917 Valéry published "La Jeune Parque" ("The Young Fate"), a dramatic monologue of over five-hundred lines, and in 1920 he published "Album de vers anciens," 1890-1920 ("Album of Old Verses"). His second collection of poetry, "Charmes" ("Charms") appeared in 1922. Despite tremendous critical and popular acclaim, Valéry again put aside writing poetry. In 1925 he was elected to the Académe Francaise. He spent the remaining twenty years of his life on frequent lecture tours in and out of France, and he wrote numerous essays on poetry, painting, and dance. Paul Valéry died in Paris in July of 1945 and was given a state funeral.
Along with Paul Verlaine and Stéphane Mallarmé, Valéry is considered one the most important Symbolist writers. His highly self-conscious and philosophical style can also been seen to influence later English-language writers such T. S. Eliot and John Ashbery . His work as a critic and theorist of language was important to many of the structuralist critics of the 1960s and 1970s.

#VALERY #MRB-VALERY #MRBVALERY

Keywords/Tags: Paul Valery, French poem, English translation, sea, seaside, cemetery, grave, graves, graveyard, death, sail, sails, doves, ceiling, soul, souls, dance, sun, sunset, dusk, night, stars, infinity

Crawling through the undergrowth
looking for a moist retreat
for safeties haven in rotten logs
away from keen eyes and birds beaks

Lumbering slowly
as metamorphosis is soon
to become a beetle
that is guided by the moon

To find a mate is it's first duty
in the short time of it's life made complete
to make plenty their kind
these wriggling grubs beneath your feet


By Christos Andreas Kourtis aka NeonSolaris

The gardener
This is my garden; my apple tree
has over-reached itself.  The branches,
weighed down with fruit, threaten to break.
If I had read the signs, thinned out when it was time,
the crop would be less heavy, the fruit less small.
And what there is, is damaged.  If it’s not birds
it’s caterpillar, wasp, or earwig.
It will all be rotten soon.  I don’t know why I bother.

The blackbird
This is my garden; this tree I sat in
and proclaimed my own when it was full of blossom
with war-cry love-call song.
Then mating, nesting, bringing up the brood.
The days were scarcely long enough, but that
was long ago.  My children gone,
there’s time now for myself, time for a treat.
My yellow chisel bill breaks in the flesh
of these fine apples. Delicious. This is the life.

The wasps
This is our garden – insects do not have time
for individuality.  We built the colony, us lads,
chewed wood to make our paper nest, and now
we work to feed the grubs.
“Lads”, that is, using the word loosely – for us
gender is not important; that’s for the queen,
and, as it may be, the ones who service her,
none of our business.
But we need food too,
and if sustenance gives pleasure,
so much the better.  When we find a fruit
where blackbird’s chisel bill has broken in,
we eat our way inside, till only skin and core
encase our private eating/drinking den.
So what if it’s fermenting?  If we get tiddly,
and roll about, and buzz a drunken hum,
then who’s to care?  And if they do, we’ll sting ’em.

Crawling through the undergrowth
looking for a moist retreat
for safeties haven in rotten logs
away from keen eyes and birds beaks

Lumbering slowly
as metamorphosis is soon
to become a beetle
that is guided by the moon

To find a mate is it's first duty
in the short time of it's life made complete
to make plenty their kind
these wriggling grubs beneath your feet


By Christos Andreas Kourtis aka NeonSolaris

The mystery of Life, the mystery
Of Death, I see
Darkly as in a glass;
Their shadows pass,
And talk with me.

As the flush of a Morning Sky,
As a Morning Sky colorless--
Each yields its measure of light
To a wet world or a dry;
Each fares through day to night
With equal pace,
And then each one
Is done.

As the Sun with glory and grace
In his face,
Benignantly hot,
Graciously radiant and keen,
Ready to rise and to run,--
Not without spot,
Not even the Sun.

As the Moon
On the wax, on the wane,
With night for her noon;
Vanishing soon,
To appear again.

As Roses that droop
Half warm, half chill, in the languid May,
And breathe out a scent
Sweet and faint;
Till the wind gives one swoop
To scatter their beauty away.

As Lilies a multitude,
One dipping, one rising, one sinking,
On rippling waters, clear blue
And pure for their drinking;
One new dead, and one opened anew,
And all good.

As a cankered pale Flower,
With death for a dower,
Each hour of its life half dead;
With death for a crown
Weighing down
Its head.

As an Eagle, half strength and half grace,
Most potent to face
Unwinking the splendor of light;
Harrying the East and the West,
Soaring aloft from our sight;
Yet one day or one night dropped to rest,
On the low common earth
Of his birth.

As a Dove,
Not alone,
In a world of her own
Full of fluttering soft noises
And tender sweet voices
Of love.

As a Mouse
Keeping house
In the fork of a tree,
With nuts in a crevice,
And an acorn or two;
What cares he
For blossoming boughs,
Or the song-singing bevies
Of birds in their glee,
Scarlet, or golden, or blue?

As a Mole grubbing underground;
When it comes to the light
It grubs its way back again,
Feeling no bias of fur
To hamper it in its stir,
Scant of pleasure and pain,
Sinking itself out of sight
Without sound.

As Waters that drop and drop,
Weariness without end,
That drop and never stop,
Wear that nothing can mend,
Till one day they drop--
Stop--
And there's an end,
And matters mend.

As Trees, beneath whose skin
We mark not the sap begin
To swell and rise,
Till the whole bursts out in green:
We mark the falling leaves
When the wide world grieves
And sighs.

As a Forest on fire,
Where maddened creatures desire
Wet mud or wings
Beyond all those things
Which could assuage desire
On this side the flaming fire.

As Wind with a sob and sigh
To which there comes no reply
But a rustle and shiver
From rushes of the river;
As Wind with a desolate moan,
Moaning on alone.

As a Desert all sand,
Blank, neither water nor land
For solace, or dwelling, or culture,
Where the storms and the wild creatures howl;
Given over to lion and vulture,
To ostrich, and jackal, and owl:
Yet somewhere an oasis lies;
There waters arise
To nourish one seedling of balm,
Perhaps, or one palm.

As the Sea,
Murmuring, shifting, swaying;
One time sunnily playing,
One time wrecking and slaying;
In whichever mood it be,
Worst or best,
Never at rest.

As still Waters and deep,
As shallow Waters that brawl,
As rapid Waters that leap
To their fall.

As Music, as Color, as Shape,
Keys of rapture and pain
Turning in vain
In a lock which turns not again,
While breaths and moments escape.

As Spring, all bloom and desire;
As Summer, all gift and fire;
As Autumn, a dying glow;
As Winter, with nought to show:

Winter which lays its dead all out of sight,
All clothed in white,
All waiting for the long-awaited light.

while i was in my garden an hedgehog i did see
he was fast a sleep beside my willow tree
rolled up in a ball tucked up nice and neat
such a lovely chap small and very sweet.

then when he a woke he began to stroll
all around the garden such a lovely soul
looking for some food. insects and some grubs
in and out the flowers in between the shrubs.

when he finished eating. back to my tree once more
then fell fast a sleep like he was before

In the beginning was Scream
Who begat Blood
Who begat Eye
Who begat Fear
Who begat Wing
Who begat Bone
Who begat Granite
Who begat Violet
Who begat Guitar
Who begat Sweat
Who begat Adam
Who begat Mary
Who begat God
Who begat Nothing
Who begat Never
Never Never Never

Who begat Crow

Screaming for Blood
Grubs, crusts

Anything

Trembling featherless elbows in the nest's filth

Venus sighs.

a camera on your own life
a camera in every room
following your daily routines
from dus(t) until Dawn
your apps have cameras
so you can update your day
like you update your software;
you update your Instagram

The noose tightens.

reality Game
no escape from the fly eggs
grubs in your routine
stitches on your day
you can’t look away or put it down
bombardment;
the reality game show re-union special
happens every time you look down
old reality recap episodes on loop in your head,
etc., etc.

Venus died
and you didn't even tweet about it.

I am The Shoes of Shoes,
which are Solomon’s. Let him polish
me with the oil from his brow, for his gloss
is better than sunshine.

Because of the fragrance of thy ointment buffed
upon me, thy name
is Scent Shine, therefore do the ****** shoes
love thy feet. Stretch me,
with your Shoe-Tree, and I will run
& rejoice with thy feet through
gardens & woods, and across mountains alike.

I am leather, but comely, O ye Daughters
of Shoeshopingham, as The Pile Beneath
the Prophesised Viaduct, and as in the abundant
bottom of The Wardrobe of Solomon.

Look not upon me, because I am leather,
but put me upon thy feet for I
am thy soles.

I am the Rose of Shoe, and the Lilly of The Laces.

As the strong shoes among thorns, so
is my love among The Shod.
As the tongue that tightens to the fruit of the foot, so is
my beloved among The Shod.
His left foot is in my left purse, and his right
foot is my right, tight.
The Polish of My Beloved, behold, cometh
glinting off llyns, he cometh leaping upon
the mountains, with both of me tight on his feet.

Looketh fourth through The Round Window
of Wisdom, through The Lattice see
him shoeing himself with my flesh.

Take us the socked foxes, the little foxes that chew & spoil,
for our shodding is tender.
My Loved Shod’s feet are mine and my leather is his.
Until the day break, and the unshod shadows flee, turn
my Loved Shod, and be thou like the shoe young on the mountains.

Behold, thou art fair, my shoes, behold thou art shoes as fast
as a flock of goats over the Mountain of Shoedon.
Thy laces are like soft strands of moss, which have been spun
& woven in the Workshops of Acorns by The Grubs of Oak.
Thy eyelets are like the sweet slots in which nestle
the seeds of the pomegranate.
Thy tongues are like scarlet leaves fallen from speaking
trees, and thy squeak as I walk in thee is comely.
Thy heal is like the shield that should’ve been
fashioned for Achilles.
Thy two toe caps are as sleek & pert as the twin otters
that fish among the lilies.
How beautiful are thee, shoes for feet, O Goddess’s daughters,
the joints of thy soft foot-slot smooth as the gleam
of jewels, the work of the hands of a cunning cobbler.

O Solomon set me twin shoes as seals
upon thy feet, for Love is as strong
as The Road to Dead we must follow. O
my Loved Shod! for every one
of thy steps you make

in me is my bliss.

By T. A. Beale

I was working my garden on a warms summers day,
When a robin flew by, from across the way,
His wings tipped with silver, black brows over his eyes,
His robins red breast, you might have guessed,
but upon his cheek, a dark mark he could not disguise,
I laughed and I smiled as I cried aloud,
"Tis brave Robin Black-Cheek, a bird most renowned!"
He bowed and sang, “Good day to you sir! My chicks need a feeding!"
I nodded and said, "There's food underground, just follow around while I do
the weeding!"
So we set to work, and into each hole that I dug,
Mr Robin flew, and emerged bearing worms or a fat wriggling bug!
Time after time, with a beak full of grubs he'd return to his nest,
As the day grew long, I could not go on, I lay down my shovel, I needed a
rest!
Mr Black-Cheek hopped on my boot, and danced an impatient jig,
He looked at me and sang, "My chicks are still hungry! Why won't you dig?"
"Rest a while, lets take a moment to speak, tell me how you got that black scar on your
cheek!"

"Very well. But I warn you now, 'tis not a tale for the meek!”
I was guarding my garden when a rogue robin rival reproached me and said,
"I shall end your life, then take your wife, she will thank me when you're
dead!"
I swooped down to meet him, I perched on the fence,
I puffed my red breast and angrily sang, “Let battle commence!”
The scoundrel soared up, beak shining like steel in the sunlight, and he sliced my cheek!
Staggered and stunned I spun round, but soon I steadied, stood straight and showed by beak!
“T'was but a slight!” I swung at him, and continued the fight!
We ****** and we pecked, we riposte and we parried,
“Leave while you can! Too long have you tarried!”
We flew and we dashed, and in mid-air we clashed,
In a flurry of feathers we fought, a final fell blow and the foul fiend was fallen,
I sang with glee; for he was forced to flee!
I returned to my tree, now no one would dare challenge me!

He bowed again once his tale was told,
“Now dig me more grubs, afore this day grows old!”
I gladly obliged, for I'd made a new friend,
and we worked all day, until the end.


© Thomas A. Beale
2015