First Love - Wisława Szymborska (Translation By Clare Cavanagh & Stanislaw Baranczak)

They say

the first love's most important.

That's very romantic,

but not my experience.

 

Something was and wasn't there between us,

something went on and went away.

 

My hands never tremble

when I stumble on silly keepsakes

and a sheaf of letters tied with string

— not even ribbon.

 

Our only meeting after years:

two chairs chatting

at a chilly table.

 

Other loves

still breathe deep inside me.

This one's too short of breath even to sigh.

 

Yet just exactly as it is,

it does what the others still can't manage:

unremembered,

not even seen in dreams,

it introduces me to death.

THE PARTY TO WHICH YOU ARE NOT INVITED - Stephen Dunn

You walk in, your clothes dark
and strangely appropriate, an arrogance
about you as if you had a ramrod
for a spine. You feel posture-perfect.

When you speak, women move away.
You smile, and men see tombstones.
They think they know who you are,
that they could throw you out

as they could one man. But today you are
every man who has been omitted
from any list: how quickly they see
they would have no chance.

You pour yourself a drink,
as if ready to become one of them.
Under your skin, nerve endings, loose
wires, almost perceivable. Something

somewhere is burning. You tell them
you’ve dreamed of moments like this,
to be in their lovely house,
to have everyone’s attention. You ask

of the children, are they napping?
You extend your hand to the host,
who won’t take it, reminds you
you were not invited, never will be.

You have things in your pockets
for everybody. House gifts.
Soon you’ll give them out.
If only they could understand

how you could be ruined
by kindness, how much
you could love them
if they knew how to stop you.

Lost - Charles Bukowski

they say that hell is crowded, yet,
when you’re in hell,
you always seem to be alone.
& you can’t tell anyone when you’re in hell
or they’ll think you’re crazy
& being crazy is being in hell
& being sane is hellish too.

those who escape hell, however,
never talk about it
& nothing much bothers them after that.
I mean, things like missing a meal,
going to jail, wrecking your car,
or even the idea of death itself.

when you ask them,
“how are things?”
they’ll always answer, “fine, just fine…”

once you’ve been to hell and back,
that’s enough
it’s the greatest satisfaction known to man.

once you’ve been to hell and back,
you don’t look behind you when the floor creaks
and the sun is always up at midnight
and things like the eyes of mice
or an abandoned tire in a vacant lot
can make you smile
once you’ve been to hell and back.

Traveling - Stephen Dunn

If you travel alone, hitchhiking,

sleeping in woods,

make a cathedral of the moonlight

that reaches you, and lie down in it.

Shake a box of nails

at the night sounds

for there is comfort in your own noise.

And say out loud:

somebody at sunrise be distraught

for love of me,

somebody at sunset call my name.

There will soon be company.

But if the moon clouds over

you have to live with disapproval.

You are a traveler,

you know the open, hostile smiles

of those stuck in their lives.

Make a fire.

If the Devil sits down, offer companionship,

tell her you’ve always admired

her magnificent, false moves.

Then recite the list

of what you’ve learned to do without.

It is stronger than prayer.

EXAGGERATION - Scarriet Editors

You must know I’m not usually excitable,

But how long must I be calm and pleasantly glad?

I have read about love. It was sad.

The man paced outside the window. The woman

Covered her arms in folds of crimson and myrtle.

The tradition arrived every night this year.

Every woman attended. This is no exaggeration;

They crowded, they pushed ahead—even the dearest woman.

I affected learning. I thought this decision up in my own mind.

The poetry readings, seminars; failures in oak,

Scratches, graffiti, partly undressed tables, inside and outside the mind.

I affected poetry. It did no good. I was too calm;

I went on in hushed tones about my childhood;

Stood near her by the window, even laughed.

It wouldn’t do to repeat it now, even if I could.

There is a need to exaggerate, even without drama or poems,

To not flag, to make oneself happy; to pretend a woman’s figure

Will make one happy, and this is all a man needs.

Life is dull. We exaggerate. And so it proceeds.

Look for Me - Ted Kooser

Look for me under the hood

of that old Chevrolet settled in weeds

at the end of the pasture.

I'm the radiator that spent its years

bolted in front of an engine

shoving me forward into the wind.

Whatever was in me in those days

has mostly leaked away,

but my cap's still screwed on tight

and I know the names of all these

tattered moths and broken grasshoppers

the rest of you've forgotten.

THE MEN THAT DON'T FIT IN - Robert W. Service

There's a race of men that don't fit in,

    A race that can't stay still;

So they break the hearts of kith and kin,

    And they roam the world at will.

They range the field and they rove the flood,

    And they climb the mountain's crest;

Theirs is the curse of the gypsy blood,

    And they don't know how to rest.

If they just went straight they might go far;

    They are strong and brave and true;

But they're always tired of the things that are,

    And they want the strange and new.

They say: "Could I find my proper groove,

    What a deep mark I would make!"

So they chop and change, and each fresh move

    Is only a fresh mistake.

And each forgets, as he strips and runs

    With a brilliant, fitful pace,

It's the steady, quiet, plodding ones

    Who win in the lifelong race.

And each forgets that his youth has fled,

    Forgets that his prime is past,

Till he stands one day, with a hope that's dead,

    In the glare of the truth at last.

He has failed, he has failed; he has missed his chance;

    He has just done things by half.

Life's been a jolly good joke on him,

    And now is the time to laugh.

Ha, ha! He is one of the Legion Lost;

    He was never meant to win;

He's a rolling stone, and it's bred in the bone;

    He's a man who won't fit in.