Something Like the Capillary Effect

Colleen spilled some coffee on her pants yesterday, and I, being the dutiful housewife I am, set the pants aside to soak so the stain wouldn't set. At first I only put in the water the part of the pant leg on which she had spilled not realizing that through the wonderful magic of diffusion--that law governing fluid motion that can defy even the almighty law of gravity--the pants would carry soapy water up out of the bowl onto the kitchen floor. When I awoke this morning, the floor was absolutely covered.

an old-fashioned alexandrian book-burnin

all the good politicos, even the salad guy,
know the books to keep, which bundles of paper
to feed the holocaust; how to find
the most efficient wife willing to withdraw
to a red bedchamber, delicate and dark,
full of cheap lovers, cheaper casks of liquor;

how to avoid crowds creeping carelessly
towards changing tastes and opposed opinions.

dry leaves sizzle in the initial drops of a rainstorm
that catches her notice and fades into hissing

in old alexandria the lexicographers
steal the finest tomes, give back duplicates.

and old Caesar Salad was tossed and embossed
his egyptian whore by the wine-dark sea;
he had nervous fits hardly contained by
the soothsayers, the priests and augurs
who translate the signs of burning passions
unable to surmount the poisonous asp.

The funny thing about translating poetry so much is that you start to think you can actually write some yourself. You spend so much time converting verse into something resembling (or often not-so-resembling) verse that you convince yourself that you no longer need to lean on the crutch of a foreign original upon which your art, if you can call it that, usually relies. Arrogance is the only thing that can truly overcome the natural grounding force of good old-fashioned common sense.