Birth Poems
The Pig
by Roald Dahl
In England once there lived a big
And wonderfully clever pig.
To everybody it was plain
That Piggy had a massive brain.
He worked out sums inside his head,
There was no book he hadn't read.
He knew what made an airplane fly,
He knew how engines worked and why.
He knew all this, but in the end
One question drove him round the bend:
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Duino Elegies: The First Elegy
by Rainer Maria Rilke
Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels'
hierarchies? and even if one of them suddenly
pressed me against his heart, I would perish
in the embrace of his stronger existence.
For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror
which we are barely able to endure and are awed
because it serenely disdains to annihilate us.
Each single angel is terrifying.
And so I force myself, swallow and hold back
the surging call of my dark sobbing.
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The List Of Famous Hats
by James Tate
Napoleon's hat is an obvious choice I guess to list as a famous
hat, but that's not the hat I have in mind. That was his hat for
show. I am thinking of his private bathing cap, which in all hon-
esty wasn't much different than the one any jerk might buy at a
corner drugstore now, except for two minor eccentricities. The
first one isn't even funny: Simply it was a white rubber bathing
cap, but too small. Napoleon led such a hectic life ever since his
childhood, even farther back than that, that he never had a
chance to buy a new bathing cap and still as a grown-up--well,
he didn't really grow that much, but his head did: He was a pin-
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Prayer Before Birth
by Louis Macneice
I am not yet born; O hear me.
Let not the bloodsucking bat or the rat or the stoat or the
club-footed ghoul come near me.
I am not yet born, console me.
I fear that the human race may with tall walls wall me,
with strong drugs dope me, with wise lies lure me,
on black racks rack me, in blood-baths roll me.
I am not yet born; provide me
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Dejection: An Ode
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Late, late yestreen I saw the new Moon,
With the old Moon in her arms ;
And I fear, I fear, My Master dear !
We shall have a deadly storm.
Ballad of Sir Patrick Spence
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I
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A Late Development
by Evelyn Judy Buehler
Bud
so rich
in promise
nature's baby
awaits the sunshine
and long days of colors
A kelly green world's sighing
so avid for the plums and pinks
in the middle of eternity
in the middle of glorious summer
......
Born
by Aldo Kraas
Born
Born to enjoy nature
Born to swim in the body of Elora Gorge
With a life jacket of course
Born to sing songs to people and Mother nature
Born to try different foods
Born to be living among different cultures
Born to shine
Born to write how I feel from the inside out
Born to have my own style of clothes
......
A day in November
by Mario Odekerken
In the chill of November,
the world wrapped in a blanket of gray,
she feels the first stirrings,
a quiet promise beneath her heart.
The trees stand bare,
their branches reaching for the sky,
echoing the anticipation,
the breath of life waiting to unfold.
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Antinatalist Poetry by Michael R. Burch
by Michael R. Burch
These are antinatalist poems and translations by Michael R. Burch. The antinatalist translations include poems and prose by Al-Ma'arri, Aristotle, Buddha, Homer, Omar Khayyam, Sappho, Seneca, the bible's King Solomon, and Sophocles.
Antinatalism is the belief that human beings should not procreate. Do we have the "right" to bring other human beings into a world that was always "red in tooth and claw" and is now increasingly deadly due to global warming, nuclear weapons, drone warfare and maniacal leaders like Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Putin, Jong-un, Netanyahu and Trump?
There were antinatalist notes in Homer, around 3,000 years ago ...
HOMER
For the gods have decreed that unfortunate mortals must suffer, while they remain sorrowless. — Homer (circa 800 BC), Iliad 24.525-526, translation by Michael R. Burch
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A Timeless Birth
by George Payne
A Timeless Birth
I believe that you
existed in me
before this womb, full
of silk fiber hair
and enrobed in fluids
of blood orange and
honey; there is an
unbreakable feel
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