The First Four Books of Poems: A Mask for Janus, the Dancing Bears, Green with Beasts, the Drunk in the Furnace / W.S. Merwin. by W. S. Merwin (Paperback, 2000)
Half RoundelI make prayer For the spoilt season, The weed of Eden. I make prayer. Save us the green In the weed of time.Now is November; In night uneasy Nothing I say. I make prayer. Save us from the water That washes us away.What do I ponder? All smiled disguise, Lights in cold places, I make prayer. Save us from air That wears us loosely.The leaf of summer To cold has come In little time. I make prayer. From earth deliver And the dark therein.Now is whisper Through all the living. I speak to thing. I make prayer. Save us from fire Consuming up and down.Evening with Lee Shore and CliffsSea-shimmer, faint haze, and far out a bird Dipping for flies or fish. Then, when over That wide silk suddenly the shadow Spread skating, who turned with a shiver High in the rocks? And knew, then only, the waves' Layering patience: how they would follow after, After, dogged as sleep, to his inland Dreams, oh beyond the one lamb that cried In the olives, past the pines' derision. And heard Behind him t the sea's gaiety but its laughter.The FishermenWhen you think how big their feet are in black rubber And it slippery underfoot always, it is clever How they thread and manage among the sprawled nets, lines, Hooks, spidery cages with small entrances. But they are used to it. We do t kw their names. They kw our needs, and live by them, lending them wiles And beguilements we could never have fashioned for them; They carry the ends of our hungers out to drop them To wait swaying in a dark place we could never have chosen. By motions we have never learned they feed us. We lay wreaths on the sea when it has drowned them.
Product Identifiers
Publisher
Copper Canyon Press,U.S.
ISBN-10
155659139x
ISBN-13
9781556591396
eBay Product ID (ePID)
189545444
Dimensions
Weight
449g
Height
228mm
Width
153mm
Additional Product Features
Spine
22mm
Author Biography
W.S. Merwin is one of America's leading poets. His prizes include the 2005 National Book Award for his collected poems, Migration, the Pulitzer Prize, the Stevens Award, and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and Lannan Foundation. He is the author of dozens of books of poetry and translations. He lives in Hawaii, where he cultivates endangered palm trees.