Pane Caldo

Rising in the morning
like warm bread,
from a bed
in America,
the aroma
of my baking
reaches you
in Italy,
rocking in your boat
near the Ponte Longo,
cutting through the glitter
of yesterday's moonlight
on your sunstruck
canal.

My delicious baker-
it is you
who have made
this hot bread
rise.

[...] Read more

poem by Erica Jong
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Time Leak

For centuries
we have lain like this,
our warmths intermingled,
our hearts beating
the same two-step,
& our breaths
& our limbs
intertwined.

Life after life,
I return to flesh
to join my flesh
to your flesh.
Sometimes I am the woman
& you the man;
sometimes,
the other way around.

It hardly matters.
Flesh after flesh,

[...] Read more

poem by Erica Jong
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

In Praise of Clothes

If it is only for the taking off-
the velvet cloak,
the ostrich feather boa,
the dress which slithers to the floor
with the sound of strange men sighing
on imagined street corners. . .

If it is only for the taking off-
the red lace bra
(with rosewindows of breasts),
the red lace pants
(with dark suggestion
of Venus' first name),
the black net stockings
cobwebby as fate,
criscrossed like our lives,
the silver sandals
glimmering as rain-

clothes are necessary.

[...] Read more

poem by Erica Jong
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

The Birth Of The Water Baby

Little egg,
little nub,
full complement of
fingers, toes,
little rose blooming
in a red universe,
which once wanted you less
than emptiness,
but now holds you
fast,
containing your rapid heart
beat under its
slower one
as the earth
contains the sea...

O avocado pit
almost ready to sprout,
tiny fruit tree
within sight

[...] Read more

poem by Erica Jong
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

If God is a Dog

If God is a dog drowsing,
contemplating
the quintessential dogginess
of the universe, of the whole
canine race, why are we
uneasy?

No dog I know
would hurl thunderbolts,
or plant plague germs,
or shower us with darts
of pox or gonococci.
No. He lies on his back
awaiting
the cosmic belly rub.
He wags his tail signifying
universal love.
He frolics and cavorts
because he has just
taken a galactic shit

[...] Read more

poem by Erica Jong
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Narcissus, Photographer

"...a frozen memory, like any photo,
where nothing is missing, not even,
and especially, nothingness..."
-- Julio Cortázar, "Blow Up"

Mirror-mad,
he photographed reflections:
sunstorms in puddles,
cities in canals,

double portraits framed
in sunglasses,
the fat phantoms who dance
on the flanks of cars.

Nothing caught his eye
unless it bent
or glistered
over something else.

[...] Read more

poem by Erica Jong
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Letter to Myselves

You can be hurt
because you want too much;
because in your face it says:
love me, nurture me;
because in your teeth it says:
sugar flows to us;
because in your tongue it says:
drive in the spike.

You can be hurt
because you care too much
because your ribs swing out like shutters
& your heart
glows like a night light.

You can be hurt
because you need too much
because your skin comes off in streamers
& your veins
twang like guitar strings.

[...] Read more

poem by Erica Jong
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Depression in Early Spring

Meathooks, notebooks,
the whole city sky palely flaming
& spectral bombs
hitting that patch of river
I see from my eastern window.

The poets are dead, the city dying.
Anne, Sylvia, Keats
with his passionate lungs,
Berryman jumping from the bridge & waving,
all the dreamers dead
of their own dreams.

Why have I stayed on as Horatio?
Anne sends poems from the grave,
Sylvia, letters.
John Keats's ghostly cough
comes through the wall board.
What am I doing here?
Why contend?

[...] Read more

poem by Erica Jong
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

The Rose

You gave me a rose
last time we met.

I told myself
if it bloomed
our love would bloom,
& if it died-

O I did not
consider
the possibility.

It died.

Though I cut
the stem
on a slant
as my mother
taught me,
though I dropped

[...] Read more

poem by Erica Jong
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

This Element

Looking for a place
where we might turn off
the inner dialogue,
the monologue
of futures & regrets,
of pasts not past enough
& futures that may never come
to pass,
we found this boat
bobbing in the blue,
this refuge amid reefs,
this white hull
within this azure sibilance of sea,
this central rocking
so like the rocking
before birth.

Venus was born of the waters,
borne over them
to teach us about love-

[...] Read more

poem by Erica Jong
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!