Purveyors of fine poetry since 2003.
except in all the ways my being
an immigrant are different
from all the ways you experience
your being an immigrant
differently from me.
And yet we are capable
of the same joy, the same
grieving, the same terrible
capacity to break and be
broken open, to choose rice
over bread, both salt and sugar,
soft instead of hard.
Up by very betimes and to my office, where all the morning till towards noon, and then by coach to Westminster Hall with Sir W. Pen, and while he went up to the House I walked in the Hall with Mr. Pierce, the surgeon, that I met there, talking about my business the other day with Holmes, whom I told my mind, and did freely tell how I do depend upon my care and diligence in my employment to bear me out against the pride of Holmes or any man else in things that are honest, and much to that purpose which I know he will make good use of. But he did advise me to take as few occasions as I can of disobliging Commanders, though this is one that every body is glad to hear that he do receive a check.
By and by the House rises and I home again with Sir W. Pen, and all the way talking of the same business, to whom I did on purpose tell him my mind freely, and let him see that it must be a wiser man than Holmes (in these very words) that shall do me any hurt while I do my duty. I to remember him of Holmes’s words against Sir J. Minnes, that he was a knave, rogue, coward, and that he will kick him and pull him by the ears, which he remembered all of them and may have occasion to do it hereafter to his owne shame to suffer them to be spoke in his presence without any reply but what I did give him, which, has caused all this feud. But I am glad of it, for I would now and then take occasion to let the world know that I will not be made a novice.
Sir W. Pen took occasion to speak about my wife’s strangeness to him and his daughter, and that believing at last that it was from his taking of Sarah to be his maid, he hath now put her away, at which I am glad.
He told me, that this day the King hath sent to the House his concurrence wholly with them against the Popish priests, Jesuits, &c., which gives great content, and I am glad of it. So home, whither my father comes and dines with us, and being willing to be merry with him I made myself so as much as I could, and so to the office, where we sat all the afternoon, and at night having done all my business I went home to my wife and father, and supped, and so to bed, my father lying with me in Ashwell’s bed in the red chamber.
the honest body
is wiser than any word
which may have to be
spoken in reply
for I would now and then
speak my strangeness
wholly against the suits
which give home to the office
noon and night
having one bed
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Thursday 2 April 1663.
Language isn't
the only gate you think
leads to the garden.
Try to enter the mind
of the one whose work
you're translating.
It might be easier to bribe
the watchman, but where
is the charm in that?
Before it existed as riddle,
the poem beat against stones
at the foot of the cliff.
Or it hung among particles
caught in the lighthouse beams
sweeping across the channel.
The sound of air passing
through the mouth is a variant
of a form that can't be seen.
The chest rises and falls. The water
recedes. Sometimes you can walk so far
without encountering a ripple.
How strange they look, the toes
like little knobs of ginger snapped
from the root, or like pulled out
taffy, cooled mid-stretch. Heels,
meanwhile, thicken with calluses from
walking or running, standing in line.
From wearing shoes made by those who don't
seem to have any idea beyond the novel
design. Surrender your feet to the woman
at the pedicure place. She'll cluck
as she lowers them into a water bath, then
pat each one dry before sanding down things
with a power tool— like furniture. Furnish,
from the mid-15th century: to fit out,
equip, provision (as in a castle, a ship,
a person). Which is to say, what's used daily,
over time needs some polish. From another angle,
they resemble two narrow isthmuses side by side,
anchoring the mainland of the body to wood floor,
bathroom tile, sandy beach or garden plot. They turn
into maps at the accupressurist's, who traces
and kneads, leans hard into a spot, saying
Liver, lung, right here! the little intestine,
blocked. Suddenly the key fits into the lock.
A marvel, as if all this time, what you've
always wanted to know was just under your heel.
Up betimes and abroad to my brother’s, but he being gone out I went to the Temple to my Cozen Roger Pepys, to see and talk with him a little; who tells me that, with much ado, the Parliament do agree to throw down Popery; but he says it is with so much spite and passion, and an endeavour of bringing all Non-conformists into the same condition, that he is afeard matters will not yet go so well as he could wish.
Thence back to my brother’s, in my way meeting Mr. Moore and talking with him about getting me some money, and calling at my brother’s they tell me that my brother is still abroad, and that my father is not yet up. At which I wondered, not thinking that he was come, though I expected him, because I looked for him at my house. So I up to his bedside and staid an hour or two talking with him. Among other things he tells me how unquiett my mother is grown, that he is not able to live almost with her, if it were not for Pall.
All other matters are as well as upon so hard conditions with my uncle Thomas we can expect them.
I left him in bed, being very weary, to come to my house to-night or tomorrow, when he pleases, and so I home, calling on the virginall maker, buying a rest for myself to tune my tryangle, and taking one of his people along with me to put it in tune once more, by which I learned how to go about it myself for the time to come.
So to dinner, my wife being lazily in bed all this morning. Ashwell and I dined below together, and a pretty girl she is, and I hope will give my wife and myself good content, being very humble and active, my cook maid do also dress my meat very well and neatly.
So to my office all the afternoon till night, and then home, calling at Sir W. Batten’s, where was Sir J. Minnes and Sir W. Pen, I telling them how by my letter this day from Commissioner Pett I hear that his Stempeese he undertook for the new ship at Woolwich, which we have been so long, to our shame, in looking for, do prove knotty and not fit for service. Lord! how Sir J. Minnes, like a mad coxcomb, did swear and stamp, swearing that Commissioner Pett hath still the old heart against the King that ever he had, and that this was his envy against his brother that was to build the ship, and all the damnable reproaches in the world, at which I was ashamed, but said little; but, upon the whole, I find him still a fool, led by the nose with stories told by Sir W. Batten, whether with or without reason. So, vexed in my mind to see things ordered so unlike gentlemen, or men of reason, I went home and to bed.
with the passion of a conformist
calling for quiet
I make a tune out of all
the aches in the world
which I am a fool to see
so unlike men of reason
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 1 April 1663.
We write messages, put them in bottles,
cast them into space. We curate what we think
is the best of us, or the most representative
of us. Music played by symphonies, the one-
note hum of a sitar, a shimmering copper
chorus of gongs, the mellow voices of poets.
Laughter, rain and foghorns; animal calls,
greetings in 55 languages. Who even knows
when or whether or not future beings
will examine our artifacts? By then,
the oceans will long have forgotten
our names and continents crumbled
in the depths like soggy croutons. Still,
we are in love with the idea that beauty
will somehow outlast the void,
that a billion light years from now,
something of us might survive, even
if only as a chord in the dust of space.
…and to that purpose I lay long talking with my wife about my father’s coming, which I expect to-day, coming up with the horses brought up for my Lord. Up and to my office, where doing business all the morning, and at Sir W. Batten’s, whither Mr. Gauden and many others came to us about business. Then home to dinner, where W. Joyce came, and he still a talking impertinent fellow. So to the office again, and hearing by and by that Madam Clerke, Pierce, and others were come to see my wife I stepped in and staid a little with them, and so to the office again, where late, and so home to supper and to bed.
with her horses
all the morning
a joy still
in her step at supper
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Tuesday 31 March 1663.
Up betimes and found my weather-glass sunk again just to the same position which it was last night before I had any fire made in my chamber, which had made it rise in two hours time above half a degree. So to my office where all the morning and at the Glass–house, and after dinner by coach with Sir W. Pen I carried my wife and her woman to Westminster, they to visit Mrs. Ferrers and Clerke, we to the Duke, where we did our usual business, and afterwards to the Tangier Committee, where among other things we all of us sealed and signed the Contract for building the Mole with my Lord Tiviott, Sir J. Lawson, and Mr. Cholmeley. A thing I did with a very ill will, because a thing which I did not at all understand, nor any or few of the whole board. We did also read over the propositions for the Civill government and Law Merchant of the town, as they were agreed on this morning at the Glasshouse by Sir R. Ford and Sir W. Rider, who drew them, Mr. Povy and myself as a Committee appointed to prepare them, which were in substance but not in the manner of executing them independent wholly upon the Governor consenting to.
Thence to see my Lord Sandwich, who I found very merry and every day better and better. So to my wife, who waited my coming at my Lord’s lodgings, and took her up and by coach home, where no sooner come but to bed, finding myself just in the same condition I was lately by the extreme cold weather, my pores stopt and so my body all inflamed and itching. So keeping myself warm and provoking myself to a moderate sweat, and so somewhat better in the morning…
we fire off
in a glass house
visit our usual war
on a mole in a hole
but who who who took up
the same flame
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Monday 30 March 1663.
A personal selection of posts from the Poetry Blogging Network and beyond. Although I tend to quote my favorite bits, please do click through and read the whole posts. You can also browse the blog digest archive at Via Negativa or, if you’d like it in your inbox, subscribe on Substack (where the posts might be truncated by some email providers).
This week: odes to mushrooms, the greenness of grief, a city of mirrors, the wayward compass, and much more. Enjoy.
Continue reading “Poetry Blog Digest 2026, Week 13”
A friend said being married
isn't hard— it's maintaining eros
that's challenging. I try to remember
if eros ever held a glitter gun in one
hand and a champagne flute in the other.
Back then, eros seemed to think love
always needed to be boldly announced,
leave a hot imprint in hotel sheets
in the middle of a weekday, pass
a sweet from its mouth to another's.
Now, after kids and a mortgage,
we've swapped flaming saganakis
for cheese sandwiches at work,
survive with coffee and Power-
Points. We've learned it takes
work for anything, including
desire. It takes work to keep
a surface fabulous, a system
running at peak efficiency.
Down in the murky depths
where lanternfish live, sparkle
and glow aren't just embellishment
or distraction: their bioluminescence
helps them blend in with the shimmer
of water hit by sunlight. But yes,
the extra rows of photophores
embedded in their bellies are also
for romance, for signaling to
potential mates in the dark—
eros saying Hey, I'm stll
here, it's still me.