Featured in the current issue of Great River Review:
Special Feature: a Tribute to Yannis Ritsos
Peter Bien • Rick Bursky • Peter Constantine • Lyle Daggett
Fereydoun Faryad • Rachel Hadas • Sam Hamill • David Harsent
Dale Jacobson • George Kalamaras • Edmund Keeley
Scott King • Angéliki Kotti • Thomas McGrath • Martin McKinsey
Paul Merchant • Amy Mims • Chrisa Prokopaki
Interview
John Haines
Fiction
Stuart Friebert
Poetry
Robert Bly • Dan Butterfass • John Chávez
Bill Christopherson • Stephen Dobyns • Stephen Dunn
Colette Inez • John Krumberger • Lance Larsen
Leslie Adrienne Miller • Dave Smith • Thomas R. Smith
Gabriel Spera • Joyce Sutphen • Susan Terris • Jean Valentine
Paying Attention to the Melody
ROBERT BLY
All right. I know that each of us will die alone.
It doesn't matter how loud or soft the sitar plays.
Sooner or later the melody will say it all.
The prologue is so long! At last the theme comes.
It says the soul will rise above all these notes.
It says the dust will be swept up from the floor.
It doesn't matter if we say our prayers or not.
We know the canoe is heading straight for the falls,
And no one will pick us up from the water this time.
One day the mice will carry our ragged impulses
All the way to Egypt, and at home the cows
Will graze on a thousand acres of thought.
Everyone goes on hoping for a good death.
The old rope hangs down from the hangman's nail.
The forty-nine robbers are climbing into their boots.
Robert, don't expect too much. You've put yourself
Ahead of others for years, a hundred years.
It will take a long time for you to hear the melody.
|
