Poetry

Highbrow in the Hay

O lazy sleeper harvest here,
how can thee dream of heaven’s hall?
Sharpened threshers come ever near,
still the painting on the marble wall.

Since He speeds fast, our faces shall
be still and shine within the light.
O lazy sleeper harvest here,
rise up and work the fields this night.

Pitch slow the grass that dried today,
make the bales stack up with hastened fear,
in the hayloft rattle with might,
scatter pride beneath the harrow,
harvest instead windrows of hay,
leave off knowledge for the sparrow,
the books, the ink forget their use,
before sun rises, let sleep loose.

Rise! Rise! O wick brightly shine!

Grain once fallen rose up to call,
clover bundles gone but for the last,
hayfork might free with tender blast—
before sharpened blades plough up all.

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The Conversation

In a dimly lit restaurant nestled in the cobbled alleys of Zürich’s Niederdorf, ten of the world’s most eminent (and eccentrically over-dressed) mathematicians gathered around a table buckling under the weight of antipasti and wild gesticulation. Archimedes, having insisted on entering the premises wrapped only in a

Dare

Dare I dream of roses, a night sky passing proud, Orion and all his friends standing, in heaven’s dark blue, not loud— Like children we remember, the home from where we were, the rocket then we boarded— steel forged and smoothed our nerve. The first kiss, the awkward bumble,

Now to Our Own

We start with feet riding on a rubber floor, a moving carriage, scuffed by thousands of shoes, our reflections caught for a second in the glass. A middle-aged man stares at us, then sinks again as the train descends into the central tunnel; brushed steel and huddled shoulders carry

Nun zu den Unseren

Wir fahren, die Füsse auf dem Gummiboden, den tausend Schuhe blank und stumpf zugleich gerieben, im fahrenden Wagen, wo für einen Augenblick unsre Spiegelbilder an den Scheiben blieben. Ein Mann mittleren Alters sieht uns an, dann sinkt sein Blick zurück ins Ungewisse, während der Zug hinab in die Tunnel fährt;