What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence.
I would like to creep back into the blogosphere once again - after a five-month period of utter silence - and announce that my silence was philosophical. I would like to say that words, that language - well, my words, my language - could not show […]

I only yesterday discovered Frieda Hughes’ new column in The Times, “Poetry with Frieda Hughes,” in which she writes about a poem she likes.
The current column showcases “Time is on your side,” a poem by Galway Kinnell (Selected Poems, Bloodaxe Books).
The poem begins:
Wait, for now.
Distrust everything if you have to.
But trust the hours. Haven’t they […]

The much anticipated translation of poems and prose of Greek poet of despair Kostas Karyotakis by Keith Taylor and William W. Reader has been published. Taylor and Reader have been collaborating on this project for years and won the 2004 Keeley and Sherrard Award from Poetry Greece magazine for two translations.

From the publisher:
KOSTAS KARYOTAKIS, Battered […]

Looking forward to receiving a copy of Κώστας Καρυωτάκης. Το εγκώμιο της φυγής by Σπύρος Βρεττός. Er, how to translate? How about: Kostas Karyotakis: The Eulogy of Escape by Spyros Vrettos.

I ordered this from the Greek online store Protoporia, along with some Ellroy and Markaris for Panos, and some school books for the kids. (I’m […]

Dear Andrew Dalby,
b priestley would like to know if you have “written anywhere in detail about the editing of Homer by Zenodotus.” If you haven’t he’d like to know if you would tell him “where to find the latest scholarship on this.”
Meanwhile, he mentions how he enjoyed your book Empire of Pleasures, pictured below.

Yes, a […]

Desire
I expect I’ll want a man like you, again.
There’s a point in the future, I’ll have you
roll up the sleeves of your tight cotton tee,
pinch the muscle there– as if to prove
there’s no dream. Your stomach, the skin
under your chin and your feet on the ground
will be firm and this will verify that I’m worn;
my […]

Blackwoman, Whitewoman
for Sonia Sanchez and Aristophanes
I love your skin–
when I lay beside you and my hands
work over you, we are art on a bed
propped up against a gallery wall.
I love the twist of our fingers,
the curious coalescence of our pigments
intertwined in genetic fascination,
our separate possibilities linking
the forgotten beneath.
When we stand in front of each other
and […]

love and thick metaphors
by Kathryn Koromilas 
i.
if i pull a thick
metaphor
out of a thin
hat, will you bring your ruler?
ii.
measure this:
i slide down the curve of your spine and whisper Silk Smooth Paper
(thickness of metaphor, 385 gsm)
i tap the skin there, press keyboard-button bones
(size of metaphor, Lucida Sans 14 pt, Bold)
and make the word dapple
–i’m about to […]

Intervention
In the photograph, they lie on stomachs,
feet hitched over the bed-head, faces held
for the two-tone camera. They are younger
than what I am now and there’s no sign
of what will change them; no lines around their eyes
and mouths, where their big moments will imprint.
No sign of how I’ll make them age, how I’ll slip
between their coupling, […]

Red
After Ted Hughes
Red was my colour. Not blue,
The aquamarine you wrapped around us,
Diaphanous so my reds shrieked
Through. It was red
I wished to find, slitting
The soft insides of my arm, stretching
The gash under the tap’s warm rush
To capture the reds, all the reds
Swirling in the sink.
And later, parading the scars
Around, as if nothing
In the world […]