Dancing Box

◆ somewhere i havenever travelled 
somewhere i havenever traveled,gladly beyond 
any experience,youreyes have their silence: 
in your most frailgesture are things which enclose me, 
or which i cannottouch because they are too near 

your slightest lookeasily will unclose me 
though i haveclosed myself as fingers, 
you open alwayspetal by petal myself as Spring opens 
(touchingskillfully,mysteriously)her first rose 

or if your wish beto close me,i and 
my life will shutvery beautifully,suddenly, 
as when the heartof this flower imagines 
the snow carefullyeverywhere descending; 

nothing which weare to perceive in this world equals 
the power of yourintense fragility:whose texture 
compels me with thecolour of its countries, 
rendering death andforever with each breathing 

(i do not know whatis is about you that closes 
and opens; onlysomething in me understands 
the voice of youreyes is deeper than all roses) 
nobody,not even therain,has such small hands 

t i carry your heart with me

i carryyour heart with me (I carry it in my heart)

 i am never without it

 anywhere i go you go, my dear

andwhatever is done by only me is your doing, my darling

i fear nofate (for you are my fate, my sweet)

i want noworld (for beautiful you are my world, my true)

and it'syou are whatever a moon has always meant

 and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here isthe deepest secret nobody knows

 here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and thesky of the sky of a tree called life

whichgrows higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide

and thisis the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carryyour heart

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-- by Elizabeth Bishop (1911-1979)

* OneArt  

The art of losing isn't hard to master;

so many things seem filled with the intent

to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

--Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied.  It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Writeit!) like disaster.

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