Poems by J R Solonche

 

AFTER A POEM BY ZHO LI

This afternoon's sunlight lies half in the window and half outside.
Alone, I, half in myself and half outside myself, have only myself to define me.

The world turns silent, so I in turn turn my silence on the world.
I aim it skillfully. I have a thousand arrows in the quiver of my silence.

My bow is made from the strongest tree that grows in the silent forest.
Of those who have spoken, whose word should I accept?

Of those who have spoken, whose word is best?
All right. Let the window listen to this old recluse

who will not open the door to a guest for fear
he comes only to ask the way to another's house.

 

 

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AS BAI JUYI DID

As Bai Juyi did,
I would like to read

my poems to an old
peasant woman

and change any line
she does not understand.

 

 

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THE BEGGING CUP

(After an Anonymous Chinese Poem)

A handful of clay
and a birch twig
for a handle.

Be grateful
for whatever
falls in.

Look.
These words
are first.

 

 

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FROM WANG CHANGLIN: THE THIRD TYPE OF THEFT

Geese fly over the lake,
half a long vee, plus one.

G'hanhk, g'hanhk. I feel an ache.
Nothing more to be done.

 

 

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IN HIS INTRODUCTION

In his introduction
to five poems,
Su Tung-p'o writes,
"I got drunk
and wrote
five poems."
I would be clever
but not truthful if
in the introduction
to this poem
I wrote,
"I wrote a poem
and got drunk
five times."
Yet sometimes
cleverness
feels better
than honesty.
And sometimes
one poem
feels better than
five glasses of wine.