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Agha Shahid Ali

Marina Tsvetaeva, from Earthly Signs: Moscow Diaries, 1917-1922; “A Hero of Labor”

rattling like a bag of bones:

"gretel, from a sudden clearing" & "the promise" & "what the silence says" & "calvary" by marie howe,

"i watched you disappear” by anya krugovoy silver,

"song of the hen's head" & "a sad child" & "the saints" by margaret atwood,

"bruise ghazal" & "i go back to may 1937" by sharon olds,

"harold's leap" & "do take muriel out" & "the orphan reformed" & "not waving but drowning" by stevie smith,

"we who are your closest friends" by phillip lopate,

"the loft" by richard jones,

"eating together" & "death poem" & "party" & "the numbers" by kim addonizio,

"thanks" by w. s. merwin,

"the bee meeting" & "lady lazarus" & "daddy" & "sheep in fog" & "fever 103" by sylvia plath,

"yesterday he still looked in my eyes" by marina tsvetaeva,

"we don't know how to say goodbye" & "the last toast" by anna akhmatova,

"unknown girl in the maternity ward" & "lessons in hunger" & "the truth the dead know" by anne sexton,

"anne sexton’s last letter to god" by tracey herd,

"aubade" & "the mower" by philip larkin,

"the blue bowl" by jane kenyon,

"her long illness" by donald hall,

"myth" by natasha trethewey,

"in bertram's garden" by donald justice,

"the drowned girl" & "the leavetaking" by bertolt brecht,

"ovid in the third reich" by geoffrey hill,

"musee des beaux arts" by w. h. auden,

"report from a besieged city" by zbigniew herbert,

"napoleon" by miroslav holub,

"to a poor old woman" by william carlos williams,

"the emperor of ice-cream" by wallace stevens,

"me up at does" by e.e. cummings,

"snow line" by john berryman,

"the hollow men" by t. s. eliot,

"dedication" & "in warsaw" & "a song on the end of the world" by czesław miłosz—

resonating like a bright bell:

"what the living do" & "my dead friends" & "magdalene, afterwards" by marie howe,

"funny" & "a prayer that will be answered" by anna kamieńska,

"woman unborn & "i'll open the window" & "i am panting" & “tomorrow they’ll cut me open” by anna świrszczyńska,

"the book of hours" by b. h. fairchild,

"there is a gold light in certain old paintings" by donald justice,

"when eurydice saw him..." (an excerpt) by gregory orr,

"sometimes, when the light" & "the blind leading the blind" & "there are mornings" & "monet refuses the operation" by lisel mueller,

"try to praise the mutilated world" by adam zagajewski,

"the end and the beginning" & "the tower of babel" & "discovery" & "thank-you note" by wisława szymborska,

"while eating a pear" & "the dead" by billy collins,

"never again would the birds' song be the same" by robert frost,

"a meeting" by wendell berry,

"death at daybreak" by anne reeve aldrich,

"next time" by joyce sutphen,

"the god abandons antony" by c. p. cavafy,

"goodtime jesus" by james tate,

"laura turner has collapsed" by frank o'hara,

"all my friends are finding new beliefs" by christian wiman,

"angels" by maurya simon,

"dirge without music" by edna st. vincent millay,

"i’m glad your sickness" by marina tsvetaeva,

"you will hear thunder" by anna akhmatova,

"do not go gentle into that good night" & "and death shall have no dominion" by dylan thomas,

"an arundel tomb" & "love, we must part now" & "high windows" by philip larkin,

"please read" by mary ruefle,

"men made out of words" by wallace stevens,

"ash wednesday" by t. s. eliot,