A Selection of Matsuo Basho's Haiku | ||||
| Scarecrow in the hillock Paddy field -- How unaware! How useful! Passing through the world Indeed this is just Sogi's rain shelter. A wild sea- In the distance over Sado The Milky Way. The she cat - Grown thin From love and barley. How wild the sea is, and over Sado Island, the River of Heaven Morning and evening Someone waits at Matsushima! One-sided love. Wrapping dumplings in bamboo leaves, with one finger she tidies her hair On Buddha's birthday a spotted fawn is born – just like that On Buddha's deathday, wrinkled tough old hands pray – the prayer beads' sound I like to wash, the dust of this world In the droplets of dew. With dewdrops dripping, I wish somehow I could wash this perishing world | ||||
Tuesday, December 31, 2013
Basho
Monday, December 23, 2013
Friday, December 20, 2013
A poet in Mused Online Magazine
Standing Up After Reading Whitman Early
James Carson Murphy
He sails on the ocean of
morning, keeping watch from the
high windows here, beating this
house eastward, always, against
the forceful current of light
racing endless minutes to
boom whitely above the lake.
The strand of night behind him,
he boldly navigates the
terminator´s reef to plow,
face anointed with daybreak,
the deeper waters of hope.
Each day a new sailing. Each
day the fresh tide of promise.
Wednesday, December 18, 2013
Monday, December 16, 2013
Sunday, December 15, 2013
Like Macbeth
Taylor’s
Report on Macbeth:
I
mean she was like
the
queen & stuff
and
she killed herself
&
she was like de--ad.
Her
husband he was
like
the king of
Scotland
& stuff,
but
he like died, too.
We
like had took
A
test & stuff
on
this play
from
back
in
the day—
I
mean like
way
back
When
they
was
knights
&
stuff.
Like,
she said,
And
popped her
Pink
bubblegum.
©
David Cooper August, 2012
Thursday, December 12, 2013
Blood Moon
Last night B.B. was
playing Lucille
at a juke joint
down in the swamp
when two womens
circled each other—
two womens
circled each other, but
B.B. kept playing
his lady Lucille.
That blood-burning
moon was high in the sky
that blood-burning
moon was high
in the sky.
Lightskinned Lucy
drew first blood,
cut Flossie’s arm
Wid a broken
beer bottle.
Flossie didn’t shake
Didn’t waddle,
Flossie didn’t shake
didn’t waddle—
She
sliced the air
wid a straight razor
clean and nice &
cut Lucy’s throat
like butter melt
in rice.
Flossie Mae
cut lightskinned Lucy’s
throat
just as plain as day.
Flossie Mae
Said: “You
Messed wid
my man and
now you have to pay.”
Now Lucy is
cold & dead—
Lawd, lawd
Lucy be
cold and dead. &
Flossie Mae
she in
Parchman
with the hellhound
sniffin
round her bed.
B.B. played all day
and into the night…
said B.B. played all day
and into the night—
then the world ended
and somebody
turned off the lights.
©David L. Cooper 2013
Saturday, December 7, 2013
Kind words
| I really really really liked your poems David....richly metaphorical & intense in appeal. A few that I read reminds me of Eliot's "felt thought"(to my limited knowledge). Your poems are laconic, unsentimental and powerful ! Take it as a sincere appreciation from not an expert critic but from an ordinary Indian lady who teaches literature in her class Regards, Mandira mazumder |
One and a Half Cities
Once
you and I walked
on Dover Beach
where I threw stones
into the cold, grey sea.
We stared across
the Channel in
the direction of Calais.
No tale, no two cities,
no Charles Darnay—
Just two middle-aged
Americans adrift
in a cooling love
affair as we
stared at
the charcoal grey horizon.
©David L. Cooper December 7, 2013
Sunday, December 1, 2013
Cross the Water
January gray all day
January gray all day
& it’s so cold
Freeze the body
But warms my soul—
cross the Ohio River
cross the frozen river—
cross over into Freedomland
cross over that frozen
water….
Slaver done sold
My mother…
Slaver done sold my father…
Done sold my childrun, too
Gonna keep
Steppin’
Steppin’
Over that ice
Gonna leave this
Damned Dixieland
Gonna leave this damn
Dixie-damned land
Goin’
cross the river
to Freedom’s land.
“Ain’t let nobody
Turn me ‘round…
Ain’t gonna let no
Bloodhounds
turn me ‘round…
Ain’t let no paddyrollers
turn me ‘round
Gonna cross that
River into Freedomland.
©David Cooper 11/27/13
Friday, November 29, 2013
Thursday, November 28, 2013
Red Moon
Last night B.B. was
playing Lucille
at a juke joint
down in the swamp
when two womens
circled each other—
two womens
circled each other, but
B.B. kept playing
his lady Lucille.
That blood-burning
moon was high in the sky
that blood-burning
moon was high
in the sky.
Lightskinned Lucy
drew first blood,
cut Flossie’s arm
Wid a broken
beer bottle.
Flossie didn’t shake
Didn’t waddle,
Flossie didn’t shake
didn’t waddle—
She
sliced the air
wid a straight razor
clean and nice &
cut Lucy’s throat
like butter melt
in rice.
Flossie Mae
cut lightskinned Lucy’s
throat
just as plain as day.
Flossie Mae
Said: “You
Messed wid
my man and
now you have to pay.”
Now Lucy is
cold & dead—
Lawd, lawd
Lucy be
cold and dead. &
Flossie Mae
she in
Parchman
with the hellhound
sniffin
round her bed.
B.B. played all day
and into the night…
said B.B. played all day
and into the night—
then the world ended
and somebody
turned off the lights.
©David L. Cooper 2013
Sunday, November 24, 2013
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Solo
Day drips into night
Across
The maple-treed canvas.
The humid night fills the still
Canvas
Accompanied by a symphony of cicadas.
I am alone…
Darkness blots out the horizon &
Absorbs the sky and trees
While the cicadas call their mates.
David cooper
Monday, November 18, 2013
Thursday, November 14, 2013
The Lone Carnivore
Why
is eating alone
so
noisy and unfullfilling?
The
dishes clatter in the kitchen,
the
chef shouts orders
while
I sit—alone—
at
a table
with
a sterile
white
linen tablecloth.
My
silver knife, fork
and spoon stand
at
attention
like
Beefeaters
at
Buckingham Palace.
The
young guy
across
the room
runs
his hand
over
his date’s
firm
thigh.
“Are
you ready to order, sir?”
Asks
the pretty, young
waitress.
“Yes,
I’ll have
A
companion
Ala
mode,”
I
say with
Great
seriousness. “And
A
virgin leg for dessert,”
but
she puts me
down
for the veal medallions
and
potatoes au gratin.
And
instead of hot
naked
sex for dessert,
I
will have to settle for
the
tiramisu.
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