"The Oyster"

 Francis Ponge "The Oyster"

The oyster, the size of an average pebble, looks tougher, its colour is less

uniform, brilliantly whitish. It is a stubbornly closed world. And yet, it can be

opened: one must then hold it in the hollow of a dish towel, use a jagged and

rather tricky knife, repeat this many times. Curious fingers cut themselves on it,

nails break on it: it’s tough going. Hitting it that way leaves white circles, like

halos, on its envelope.

Inside, one finds a whole world to drink and eat: under a nacreous firmament

(strictly speaking), the heavens above recline on the heavens below and form a

single pool, a viscous and greenish bag, that flows in and out when you smell it or

look at it, fringed with blackish lace along the edges.

Sometimes, a very rare formula pearls in their nacreous throat, and right away

you have an ornament.

"Northern Lights"

 Paul Auster "Northern Lights"

These are the words
that do not survive the world. And to speak them
is to vanish

into the world. Unapproachable
light
that heaves above the earth, kindling
the brief miracle

of the open eye— 

and the day that spreads
like a fire of leaves
through the first chill wind
of October

consuming the world

in the plain speech
of desire.

"The Windows"

Guillaume Apollinaire "The Windows" 

From red to green all the yellow dies
When parakeets sing in their native forests
Giblets of pihis
There's a poem to be done on the bird with only one wing
We'll send it by telephone
Giant traumatism
It makes your eyes run
Do you see that pretty girl among the young women of Turin
The young man blew his nose with his white tie
You'll raise the curtain
And now see the window opening
Spiders when hands wove the light
beauty paleness fathomless violets
Vainly we'll try to take some rest
We'll begin at midnight
When you have time you have liberty
Winkles Codfish multiple Suns and the Sea Urchin of sunset
An old pair of yellow boots in front of the window
Towers
Towers are the streets 
Well
Wells are the squares
Wells
Hollow trees sheltering vagabond mulattoes
The Chabins sing melancholy songs
To brown Chabines
And the wa-wa wild goose honks to the north
Where raccoon hunters
Scrape the fur skins
Glittering diamond
Vancouver
Where the train white with snow and lights flashing through the dark runs
    away from winter
Oh Paris
From red to green all the yellow dies
Paris Vancouver Hyères Maintenon New York and the Antilles
The window opens like an orange
The lovely fruit of light

"Fable"

Octavio Paz "Fable"

The age of fire and the age of air

The youth of water springing

From green to yellow

                                      Yellow to red

From dream to vigil

                                   From desire to act

You needed only a step and that taken without effort

The insects then were jewels who were alive

The heat lay down to rest at the edge of the pool

Rain was the light hair of a willow-tree

There was a tree growing within your hand

And as it grew it sang laughed prophesied

It cast the spells that cover space with wings

There were the simple miracles called birds

Everything belonged to everyone

                     Everyone was everything

Only one word existed immense without opposite

A word like a sun

One day exploded into smallest fragments

They were the words of the language that we speak

They are the splintered mirrors where the world

can see itself                 slaughtered

"Notice"

Charles Bukowski "notice"

the swans drown in bilge water,

take down the signs,

test the poisons,

barricade the cow

from the bull,

the peony from the sun,

take the lavender kisses from my night,

put the symphonies out on the streets

like beggars,

get the nails ready,

flog the backs of the saints,

stun frogs and mice for the cat,

burn the enthralling paintings,

piss on the dawn,

my love

is dead.

"The Lover"

Paul Éluard "The Lover"

She is standing on my eyelids
And her hair is in my hair,
She has the shape of my hands,
The colour of my eyes,
She is absorbed in my shadow
Like a stone within the sky.

Her eyes she keeps always open
And doesn’t let me sleep.
Her dreams in broad daylight
Make the suns evaporate,
Make me laugh, weep and laugh,
And speak, with nothing to say.

(Trans: Mary Ann Caws)

"I Had the Courage"

Guillaume Apollinaire 

"I Had the Courage"

I had the courage to look backward
The ghosts of my days
Mark my way and I mourn them
Some lie mouldering in Italian churches
Or in little woods of citron trees
Which flower and bear fruit
At the same time and in every season
Other days wept before dying in taverns
Where ardent odes became jaded
Before the eyes of a mulatto girl who inspired poetry
And the roses of electricity open once more
In the garden of my memory

(Trans. Daisy Aldan)