a poem for sunday

by E.D. Kain on August 2, 2009

Japan

~by Billy Collins

Today I pass the time reading
a favorite haiku,
saying the few words over and over.

It feels like eating
the same small, perfect grape
again and again.

I walk through the house reciting it
and leave its letters falling
through the air of every room.

I stand by the big silence of the piano and say it.
I say it in front of a painting of the sea.
I tap out its rhythm on an empty shelf.

I listen to myself saying it,
then I say it without listening,
then I hear it without saying it.

And when the dog looks up at me,
I kneel down on the floor
and whisper it into each of his long white ears.

It’s the one about the one-ton temple bell
with the moth sleeping on its surface,

and every time I say it, I feel the excruciating
pressure of the moth
on the surface of the iron bell.

When I say it at the window,
the bell is the world
and I am the moth resting there.

When I say it at the mirror,
I am the heavy bell
and the moth is life with its papery wings.

And later, when I say it to you in the dark,
you are the bell,
and I am the tongue of the bell, ringing you,

and the moth has flown
from its line
and moves like a hinge in the air above our bed.

Tagged as: billy collins, poems, poetry

E.D. Kain is a blogger and freelance writer. Currently he serves as Editor-in-Chief of The League of Ordinary Gentlemen and writes a tech blog at Forbes. Visit his politics blog here. He can be found occasionally composing 140 character cultural analysis on Twitter. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The National Review, The Washington Examiner, and the now-defunct True/Slant. You can also contact him via email.

{ 3 comments }

1 Will August 2, 2009 at 9:02 am

My namesake! And Virginia’s (former?) poet laureate! Well done, Kain.

2 mike farmer August 2, 2009 at 10:16 am

I got in trouble at an online poetry group I belonged to a few years back for critizing this poem. I was almost banned from the group, so obviously a lot of people like it, and like Billy Collins, although I…well, nevermind.

3 E.D. Kain August 3, 2009 at 7:31 am

I saw Billy Collins a couple years ago and he was great. Very funny. I mean, nothing at all wrong with criticizing the man’s poetry though. Poetry is just one of those things. It works for you or it doesn’t.

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