May Swenson

The flag is folded lengthwise, and lengthwise again, folding toward the open edge, so that the union of stars on the blue field remains outward in full view; a triangular folding is then begun at the striped end, by bringing the corner of the fold...

In the pond in the parkall things are doubled;
Long buildings hang andwriggle gently
Chimneysare bent legs bouncingon clouds below
A flagwags like a fishhookdown there in the sky

Women Or they should be should be pedestals little horses moving those wooden pedestals sweet moving oldfashioned to the painted motions rocking of men horses the gladdest things in the toyroom The feelingly pegs and then of their unfeelingly ears...

What does love look like
We knowthe shape of death
Death is a cloudimmense and awesome
At first a lidis lifted from the eye of light:there is a clap of sound, a white blossombelches from the jaw of fright,a pillared cloud churns fro...

The popcorn is greasy, and I forgot to bring a Kleenex
A pill that’s a bomb inside the stomach of a man
The Embassy blows up
Eructations of flame, luxuriouscauliflowers giganticize into motion

Beards of water some of them have
Others are blowing whistles of water
Faces astonished that constant water jumps from their mouths
Jaws of lions are snarling water through green teeth over chins of moss...

I like being in your apartment, and not disturbing anything
As in the woods I wouldn't want to move a tree,or change the play of sun and shadow on the ground
The yellow kitchen stool belongs right thereagainst white plaster
I haven'...

Fruit without a stone, its shiny    pulp is clear green
Inside, tiny    black microdot seeds
Skin    the color of
Imagine    a shaggy brown-green pelt    that feels like felt

She sat on a shelf, her breasts two bellies on her poked-out belly, on which the navel looked like a sucked-in mouth— her knees bent and apart, her long left arm raised, with the large hand knuckled to a bar in the ceiling— her right hand clamping...

The binocular owl,fastened to a limblike a lanternall night long,sees where allthe other birds sleep:towhee under leaves,titmouse deepin a twighouse,sapsucker grippedto a knothole lip,redwing in the reeds,swallow in the willow,flicker in the oak -...

We move by means of our mud bumps
We bubble as do the dead but more slowly
The products of excruciating purgeswe are squeezed out thin hard and dry
If we exude a stench it is petrified sainthood

Body my housemy horse my houndwhat will I dowhen you are
Where will I
How will I
What will I