Friday Flowers: Bitter Roses

Rose: Prima Donna

This Is A Sin
(By C. K. Williams)

right off we started inflicting history
on each other day after day first thing this
is historical and we gave dollars for it
and this and we gave movies and sad poems
and obviously newspapers and a little less
valentines and sometimes it got right
up against us and into us we would squeeze
it out like a worm it would come back
by itself through the pancreas through
the eye or womb and with great tenderness
on the faces of wives and babies we
would reinflict it until there was
such beauty it was unbearable because
it was too much history too much suffering
and also birds suffering their leaps
from branches dogs
lifting their dark mouths the paths
of mantises cows plopping were we afraid
of what would be left of us? sometimes
a person was erased entirely
and children dead of shame stuck
upright in the snow like pipes the wind
screaming over them or I would forget
you darling your breasts the wind
over them our lips
moving darling the child the wind breasts
our lips over them


Today we're wishing a Happy Birthday to C. K. Williams, born on this day in 1936. The intensity of his poetry makes it a hard read, drumming a rough rhythm into the head, evoking images in disturbing juxtapositions, but it drives the mind into serious contemplation, which is what I most admire in poetry.

Rose: Lime Sublime

And I'm pairing his poem with roses because I want people to read it. No other flower gets flow through internet traffic like a rose. Not orchids, dahlias, fuchsias, magnolias, begonias, sunflowers, hibiscus, plumbago, marigolds, irises, or daisies. In the assessment of the Google Image search, roses reign supreme. ;-)

So, let's enjoy these mid-Autumn beauties. With Winter just around the corner, they'll soon fade away.

Rose: Brigadoon


And here are a few vids of some more exquisite poetry:

"The Singing"

"Vertigo"

Btw, after writing this post, something was tugging at the back of my mind as regards the title, which was inspired by Williams' 1972 poetry book, I Am the Bitter Name. So, I looked up "bitter rose" and found this:

He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, s.2 ep.41 "Bitter Rose"

Enjoy!!!