Tiger-Year Poets Reading at a Tiger Grotto

Tiger-Year poets have gathered
at a tiger grotto to read poems
to each other much like those
seven sages at the Bamboo Grove.
(Tiger Grotto, Bandhavgarh National Park, India)

Hans Sachs (1494-1576):

Awake, awake! Day draws near!
In the green woods I hear
the delightful nightingale singing,
its song resounds through hill & valley.

— "Wittenberg Nightingale" (1523)

Sir Philip Sidney (1554-1586):

Come Sleep! O Sleep, the certain knot of peace,
the poor man's wealth, the prisoner's release,
take thou of me smooth pillows, sweetest bed,
a rosy garland and a weary head.

— "Come Sleep! O Sleep!" (1583)

Christopher Smart (1722-1771):

For he is quickest of any creature, of the tribe of Tiger.
For there is nothing sweeter than his peace when at rest.
For there is nothing brisker than his life when in motion.
For God has blessed him in all of his movements.

— "Jubilate Agno" (1763)
    "For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry"

William Wordsworth (1770-1850):

And I have felt a presence of elevated thoughts;
a sense sublime whose dwelling is the light of
setting suns, and the round ocean and living air,
a motion and a spirit that rolls through all things.

— "Tintern Abbey" (1798)

Friedrich Hölderlin (1770-1843):

Wide as an ocean, the river flows outward.
But the sea takes and gives memory,
and love fixes its attentive gaze,
and the poets establish that which endures.

— "Remembrance" (1803)

William Cullen Bryant (1794-1878):

He who, from zone to zone,
guides through the boundless sky thy flight,
in the long way that I must travel alone,
will lead my steps aright.

— "To a Waterfowl" (1818)

Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861):

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.

— "Sonnet 43" (1846)

Frédéric Mistral (1830-1914):

Little nightingales, cicadas, be silent!
Listen to the song of Beauty of August—
the ground was quivering under the lovers
and the little bird on the branch flew off.

— "The Beauty of August" (1848)

Emily Dickinson (1830-1886):

Bring me the sunset in a cup,
Tell me how far the morning leaps—
Tell me what time the weaver sleeps
Who spun the breadth of blue!

— "Poem 128" (1859)

Stéphane Mallarmé (1842-1898):

Exhaled from my twin pipes swift to drain
the melody in arid drifts of rain,
is the visible, serene and fictive air
of inspiration rising as if in prayer.

— "Afternoon of a Faun" (1876)

Arthur Rimbaud (1854-1891):

I embraced the summer dawn—
dreaming the warm winds and wings soared
in silence. One by one, I lifted her veils and
felt her immense body. When I awoke it was noon.

— "Dawn" (1874)

John Masefield (1878-1967):

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea & sky—
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray, the blown spume, & sea-gulls crying.

— "Sea Fever" (1916)

Boris Pasternak (1890-1960):

There's a dream— you do not sleep, you only
dream you long for sleep: someone's dozing,
two black suns are beating under eyelids,
burning eyelashes, while he's slumbering.

— "In the Wood" (1917)

Ogden Nash (1902-1971):

When the thunder stalks the sky,
When tickle-footed walks the fly,
When shirt is wet and throat is dry,
Look, my darling, that's July.

— "Summer Serenade" (1942)

Dylan Thomas (1914-1953):

And nightly under the simple stars
down the rivers of windfall light—
Time let me hail and climb golden
in the pebbles of the holy streams.

— "Fern Hill" (1945)

John Berryman (1914-1972):

What he has now to say is a long
wonder the world can bear & be.
Once in a sycamore I was glad
all at the top, and I sang.

— "Dream Song 1" (1964)

Robert Bly (born 12-23-1926):

We approach sleep, the chestnut blossoms
in the mind mingle with thoughts of pain—
the storm is coming. Darkness in the grass,
darkness in trees. A bird, forgotten, warbling.

— "Awakening" (October 1961)

Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997):

Sincerity is the key to living in Eternity—
Stand all day. Shine all night.
Bright starlight streaming the height
warmed by the sun, bathed in the moon.

— "Jumping the Gun on the Sun" (1985)

                                                            — Peter Y. Chou
                                                                Mountain View, 5-5-2017