Henri Cole Poems

There's a black bear
in the apple tree
and he won't come down.
I can hear him panting,
...

Liar, I thought, kneeling with the others,
how can He love me and hate what I am?
The dome of St. Peter's shone yellowish
...

Waking from comalike sleep, I saw the poppies,
with their limp necks and unregimented beauty.
Pause, I thought, say something true: It was night,
I wanted to kiss your lips, which remained supple,
...

This well-used little bag is just the right size

to carry a copy of the Psalms. Its plain-woven

flowers and helicopter share the sky with bombs
...

The pony and the deer are trapped by tanks,

and the lady with the guitar is sad beyond words.

Hurtling across the sky, a missile has mistaken
...

I saw you
unexpectedly
on the street today.
Though it was midday
...

A mother is a mother still,

The holiest thing alive.

Coleridge, "The Three Graves"
...

[Nara Deer Park]


With my head on his spotted back

and his head on the grass—a little bored
...

My father lived in a dirty dish mausoleum,
watching a portable black-and-white television,
reading the Encyclopedia Britannica,
...

First I saw the round bill, like a bud;
then the sooty crested head, with avernal eyes
flickering, distressed, then the peculiar
long neck wrapping and unwrapping itself,
...