Weekly Contest
Classic poem of the day
Mousie, mousie,
Where is your little wee housie?
Here is the door,
Under the floor,
Said mousie, mousie.
Mousie, mousie,
May I come into your housie?
You can't get in,
You have to be thin,
Said mousie, mousie.
Mousie, mousie,
Won't you come out of your housie?
I'm sorry to say
I'm busy all day,
Said mousie, mousie.
member poem of the day
This is my modern English translation of Paul Valéry's poem “Le cimetière marin” (“The graveyard by the sea”). Valéry was buried in the seaside cemetery evoked in his best-known poem. From the vantage of the cemetery, the tombs seemed to “support” a sea-ceiling dotted with white sails. Valéry begins and ends his poem with this image ...
Excerpts from “Le cimetière marin” (“The graveyard by the sea”)
from Charmes ou poèmes (1922)
by Paul Valéry
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Do not, O my soul, aspire to immortal life, but exhaust what is possible.
—Pindar, Pythian Ode 3
1.
This tranquil ceiling, where white doves are sailing,
stands propped between tall pines and foundational tombs,
as the noonday sun composes, with its flames,
sea-waves forever forming and reforming ...
O, what a boon
