Elizabeth Bishop

The brown enormous odor he lived bywas too close, with its breathing and thick hair,for him to judge
The floor was rotten; the stywas plastered halfway up with glass-smooth dung
Light-lashed, self-righteous, above moving snouts,the pigs'...

This celestial seascape, with white herons got up as angels,flying high as they want and as far as they want sidewise in tiers and tiers of immaculate reflections; the whole region, from the highest heron down to the weightless mangrove island wit...

For Thomas Edwards Wanning Think of the storm roaming the sky uneasilylike a dog looking for a place to sleep in,listen to it growling
Think how they must look now, the mangrove keyslying out there unresponsive to the lightningin dark, coarse...

Out on the high "bird islands," Ciboux and Hertford, the razorbill auks and the silly-looking puffins all stand with their backs to the mainland in solemn, uneven lines along the cliff's brown grass-frayed edge, while the few sheep pastu...

September rain falls on the house
In the failing light, the old grandmothersits in the kitchen with the childbeside the Little Marvel Stove,reading the jokes from the almanac,laughing and talking to hide her tears
She thinks that her equ...

In Worcester,
Massachusetts,
I went with Aunt Consueloto keep her dentist's appointmentand sat and waited for herin the dentist's waiting room
It was winter

In the cold, cold parlormy mother laid out Arthurbeneath the chromographs:
Edward,
Prince of Wales,with Princess Alexandra,and King George with Queen Mary
Below them on the tablestood a stuffed loonshot and stuffed by

The tumult in the heart keeps asking questions
And then it stops and undertakes to answer in the same tone of voice
No one could tell the difference
Uninnocent, these conversations start, and then engage the senses, only half-meanin...

Remembering the Strait of Belle Isle orsome northerly harbor of Labrador,before he became a schoolteachera great-uncle painted a big picture
Receding for miles on either sideinto a flushed, still skyare overhanging pale blue cliffshundreds of...

I caught a tremendous fish
and held him beside the boat
half out of water, with my hook
fast in a corner of his mouth.

Earliest morning, switching all the tracksthat cross the sky from cinder star to star, coupling the ends of streets to trains of draw us into daylight in our beds;and clear away what presses on the brain: put out the neon shapes that float and swe...

This is the time of yearwhen almost every nightthe frail, illegal fire balloons appear
Climbing the mountain height,rising toward a saintstill honored in these parts,the paper chambers flush and fill with lightthat comes and goes, like hearts...