isom

Put it all to the torch! And the king named one by one
the towers, the gates, the temples — this marvel of the world;
then brightened, as the thought leaped into words:
“Only be sure the Poet’s House is spared.”

- Leningrad, October 1961

— Anna Akhmatova (from “Alexander at Thebes”)

trans. by Stanley Kunitz with Max Hayward

more macro-crop. 
from the mouth of
one endearing ess
essss roggenbuck.

www.livemylief.com

deepstep.

“Because the unconnected life / is not worth living”

—  C.D. Wright (from “And It Came To Pass” from TREMBLE)

— Jane Hirshfield (from “Fifteen Pebbles” in Come, Thief)

— Vera Pavlova (from the Russian, translated by Steven Seymour)

*film still from “Elizabeth” with Cate Blanchett

— Vera Pavlova (from the Russian, translated by Steven Seymour)

permitted regrets. yes.

vera: спаcибо.

— Allen Ginsberg (from “The End” in KADDISH)