El Desdichado

Je suis le Ténébreux, - le Veuf, - l'Inconsolé,
Le Prince d'Aquitaine à la Tour abolie :
Ma seule Etoile est morte, - et mon luth constellé
Porte le Soleil noir de la Mélancolie.

Dans la nuit du Tombeau, Toi qui m'as consolé,
Rends-moi le Pausilippe et la mer d'Italie,
La fleur qui plaisait tant à mon coeur désolé,
Et la treille où le Pampre à la Rose s'allie.

Suis-je Amour ou Phébus ?... Lusignan ou Biron ?
Mon front est rouge encor du baiser de la Reine ;
J'ai rêvé dans la Grotte où nage la sirène...

Et j'ai deux fois vainqueur traversé l'Achéron :
Modulant tour à tour sur la lyre d'Orphée
Les soupirs de la Sainte et les cris de la Fée.


~~~


I am the dark one, widower, unconsoled,
The Aquitanian Prince of the tumbled Tower:
My sole star is dead,—my constellated lute
Calls up the black sun of Melancholia.

Comforter, in the tomb's total night
Give me back Posillipo and the Italian sea,
The flower that my desolate heart adored,
The trellis where the rose twines round the vine.

Am I Amor or Phoebus?...Lusignan or Biron?
My forehead still burns red with the Queen's kiss;
I've dreamt in the grotto where the mermaid swims...

I've crossed Acheron twice as conqueror,
Wringing from Orpheus' lyre-strings the sighs
Of the saint, turn by turn with the Faerie's cries.


—Gerard de Nerval (translated PCS)

Running to Paradise

As I came over Windy Gap
They threw a halfpenny into my cap,
For I am running to Paradise;
And all that I need do is to wish
And somebody puts his hand in the dish
To throw me a bit of salted fish:
And there the king is but as the beggar.

My brother Mourteen is worn out
With skelping his big brawling lout,
And I am running to Paradise;
A poor life do what he can,
And though he keep a dog and a gun,
A serving maid and a serving man:
And there the king is but as the beggar.

Poor men have grown to be rich men,
And rich men grown to be poor again,
And I am running to Paradise;
And many a darling wit’s grown dull
That tossed a bare heel when at school,
Now it has filled an old sock full:
And there the king is but as the beggar.

The wind is old and still at play
While I must hurry upon my way,
For I am running to Paradise;
Yet never have I lit on a friend
To take my fancy like the wind
That nobody can buy or bind:
And there the king is but as the beggar.


—W.B. Yeats

Bermudas

Where the remote Bermudas ride,
In the ocean's bosom unespied,
From a small boat, that rowed along,
The listening winds received this song :

"What should we do but sing His praise
That led us through the watery maze,
Unto an isle so long unknown,
And yet far kinder than our own ?
Where He the huge sea-monsters wracks,
That lift the deep upon their backs ;
He lands us on a grassy stage,
Safe from the storms, and prelate's rage.
He gave us this eternal spring,
Which here enamels every thing,
And sends the fowls to us in care,
On daily visits through the air ;
He hangs in shades the orange bright,
Like golden lamps in a green night,
And does in the pomegranates close
Jewels more rich than Ormus shows ;
He makes the figs our mouths to meet,
And throws the melons at our feet ;
But apples plants of such a price,
No tree could ever bear them twice ;
With cedars chosen by His hand,
From Lebanon, He stores the land,
And makes the hollow seas, that roar,
Proclaim the ambergris on shore ;
He cast (of which we rather boast)
The Gospel's pearl upon our coast,
And in these rocks for us did frame
A temple where to sound His name.
Oh ! let our voice His praise exalt,
Till it arrive at Heaven's vault,
Which, thence (perhaps) rebounding, may
Echo beyond the Mexique Bay."

Thus sung they, in the English boat,
An holy and a cheerful note ;
And all the way, to guide their chime,
With falling oars they kept the time.


—Andrew Marvell

The Shit Creek Corporation Annual Report

One hundred and forty-one authors(I think--please count and check) have had or are about to have work in Shit Creek Review+II and The Chimaera:

A.E. Stallings, Aaron V. Poochigian, Adam Elgar, Alan Sullivan, Alan Wickes, Alison Brackenbury, Amanda Laughtland, Amy Nawrocki, Andrew Frisardi, Angela France, Anna Evans, Antoine Cassar, Antonia Clarke, Arlene Ang, Arthur Durkee, Bee Smith, Brent Fisk, Brian Dion, C. D. Russell, C.B. Anderson, C.E. Chaffin, Cami Park, Catherine Chandler, Charles Musser, Chris Mooney-Singh, Chris O’Carroll, Christopher Hanson, Cindy Nelson-Nold, Claudia Gary, Corey Cook, Corey Mesler, D.C. Andersson, Daniel Haar, Danielle Lapidoth, Dave McClure, David Anthony, David Landrum, David Rosenthal, David Thornbrugh, Debjani Chatterjee, Dennis Greene, Don Kimball, Donald Zirilli, Duncan Gillies MacLaurin, Earl Haig, Elizabeth Barrie, Emily Brink, Eve Anthony Hanninen, Fintan O'Higgins, Frank Osen, Gail White, Gary Charles Wilkens, George Good, Guy Kettlehack, Harvey Goldner, Henry Quince, Howie Good, JBMulligan, James AL Midgley, James Keane, Jan Iwaszkiewicz, Janet Kenny, Janice D. Soderling, Jee Leong Koh, Jeffrey Calhoun, Jehanne Dubrow, Jennifer Reeser, Jerry G. Erwin, John Milbury-Steen, John Whitworth, Jon Ballard, Joseph S. Salemi, Jude Godwin, Judy Kaber, Juleigh Howard-Hobson, Julie Carter, K.R. Copeland, Karen Bryant, Kate Bernadette Benedict, Kei Miller, Kevin Andrew Murphy, Kirby Wright, Kirk Nesset, L. Ward Abel, Lafayette Wattles, Larry Fontenot, Lee Harlin Bahan, Lee Passarella, Leo Yankevich, Louie Crew, M.A. Griffiths, Margaret Menamin, Mark Allinson, Mark Blaeuer, Mary Alexandra Agner, Mary Ann Mayer, Mary Meriam, Maryann Corbett, Michael Cantor, Michele Lesko, Mike Alexander, Neil Carpathios, Nic Sebastian, Nicolette Bethel, Nigel Holt, Nigel McLoughlin, Patricia Sims, Patricia Wallace Jones, Patrick Carrington, Peter H Desmond, Peter Richards, Peter Schwartz, Peter Wyton, Quincy Lehr, Rachel Bunting, Ralph C. La Rosa, Rhina Espaillat, Richard Epstein, Rick Mullin, Rik Roots, Rob A. Mackenzie, Robert Bolick, Robert Clawson, Rose Kelleher, Salli Shepherd, Sam Byfield, Samuel Prince, Simon Hunt, Stephen Payne, Stephen Scaer, Susan McLean, Thomas Rodes, Tiel Aisha Ansari, Tim Murphy, Tom Sheehan, Tony Williams, Wendy Sloan, Wendy Videlock, William Doreski, William McGonagall III.

SCR+II and The Chimaera have been read at least 10,969 times. The SCR Blog has been read 9282 times.

Corruption to the tune of countless millions of $$$ has been exploited and harvested by the sleazy editorial team in bribes, kickbacks, poems-for-cash, cross-promotion, round-the-world trips, sexual favours and serial attacks on the Shit Creek Office Petty Cash tin and whisky supply.

Individual editors have had mixed fortunes: one has gone missing in the desert, one is under heavy sedation, one has gone to Oregon, one is studying for a higher degree, and one has fractured her sternum while performing acrobatics tricks (including a Grand Jeté with Triple Somersault and Pike) on high scaffolding.

The Board expects that these achievements will be easily equalled and surpassed in Poetic Year 2008, with contributors and readers being drawn from an even wider geographical, linguistic and socio-economic base, and corruption revenues enhanced by a rigorous pruning of contributing poets' rights and amenities.

Concerns expressed by nervous observers to the effect that there are far too many online poetry magazines aimed at servicing a particular online poetry community have been airily dismissed by Chairman of the Board Paul Stevens in his Annual Address to Shit Creek Paddlers, who remarked: "Let them bake cake!" He pointed out that members of that particular community will find it harder and harder to win publication in magazines in the SCR stable due to the ongoing widening of the SCR contributor recruitment base. He noted that current operations in the British Isles particularly are achieving spectacular success in raising the bribe/publication ratio and yield, and went on to predict that the going rate for inclusion in SCR publications, whether expressed in $US, gold ounces, or degrees of required kinship proximity, will soon price online poetry community members out of the market.

14 by 14 Sonnet Heaven

14 sonnets by 14 sonneteers: 14by14 isa new online poetry magazine devoted to the 14-liner. There are more voltas than you can poke an octave at here, and as for the sestets...

This ezine is seriously good work, and delivers a concentrated and hit of pure poetry. My favourite? Elizabeth Klise von Zerneck's So They Would Not Steal Bites of Sugared Cake—the quirkiest, most delightful poem I've seen in a long time (and I've seen some outstanding ones).

Congratulations to Peter Bloxsom, 14by14's editor, for putting together this small but perfectly-formed gem:

http://www.14by14.com/

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