Poetry

Literature 4 threads →

298 Verse

20 Mar 2026

Invictus by William Ernest Henley

source poeticreveries.com

 Beautiful 🤩Out of the night that covers meBlack as the pit from pole to pole,I thank whatever gods may beFor my unconquerable soul.In the fell clutch of circumstance, 

279 Verse

04 Mar 2026

To see a world in a grain of sand

source poeticreveries.com

 Those first 4 lines!To see a World in a Grain of SandAnd a Heaven in a Wild FlowerHold Infinity in the palm of your handAnd Eternity in an hourA Robin Red breast in a Cage 

Poetry William Blake 4 threads →

249 Verse

15 Feb 2026

Go to the limits of your longing

source Substack

 I woke up and began my doomscrolling session on Substack and came across a note by [the awesome Cate Hall](https://substack.com/@usefulfictions/note/c-214648890?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=1eft5) with a screenshot of Rilke's 'Go to the Limits of Your Longing' poem.[The translation](https://onbeing.org/poetry/go-to-the-limits-of-your-longing/) is under copyright but out of curiosity I asked Gemini and Claude to find the [original German version](https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/24288) and then translate it:*God speaks to each of us before our making,* *then walks in silence as the night is breaking.* *But the words spoken before we each begin—* *these words, like silver, are these:**You, sent out beyond your own senses,* *go to the edge of your longing;* *clothe me.**Grow like a fire behind all things,* *so that their shadows, stretched wide,* *may always cover me entirely.**Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.* *One must only keep going: no feeling is the furthest.* *Do not let yourself be severed from me.* 

Poetry Rainer Maria Rilke 4 threads →

243 Link

11 Feb 2026

Build something you care about and benefits others

source blog.cosmos-institute.org

Everyone seems to want “scale” and “impact” and seems to think that means having a massive operation. But doing something right on a small scale breeds imitators—it is like a seed. Great Books institutions were always small, but they have been enormously influential. There’s nothing more “scalable” than wheat or bread, but no one owns all the wheat nor the bread-making recipes. It doesn’t take much thinking to see that this…

Books Reading Literature 4 threads →

224 Link

01 Feb 2026

What does it mean to translate something?

source scroll.in

Translation is the act of removing that ladder and replacing it with another ladder, replacing one language with another. In this view, a successful translation can be seen as one that is able to produce the experiences and imagination of the original novel. If this is the aim and consequence of reading, questions of equivalence and felicity are not as significant as it is made out to be by many translators. A good…

Literature Translation Kuvempu 4 threads →

223 Link

01 Feb 2026

I have always felt alright in my company

source The Nobel Prize

I was an untroublesome child who looked after herself. For a short time I went to the village kindergarten, but I didn’t feel too good there. My strongest memory of the place is of being made to have a lie-down in the middle of the day and of sitting in a tree when I didn’t want to play with the other children. But I did have a lot of freedom, which these days would be unimaginable. I used to spend a lot of time at the…

Literature Solitude Curiosity 4 threads →

199 Link

24 Jan 2026

Dare to feel

source The Marginalian

Cummings should know — just four years earlier, he had fought that hardest battle himself: When he was awarded the prestigious Academy of American Poets annual fellowship — the MacArthur of poetry — Cummings had to withstand harsh criticism from traditionalists who besieged him with hate for the bravery of breaking with tradition and being nobody-but-himself in his art. With an eye to that unassailable creative integrity…

Philosophy Life Art 4 threads →

191 Link

20 Jan 2026

Can books teach you anything?

This is perhaps tangential, but I think the "books can't teach you anything" argument comes from the accurate observation that most modern novels honestly can't teach you anything. Classic literature was consumed with the struggle between good and evil; it obsessed over the question of humanity and its greater purpose; it scrutinized what it means to find true happiness. It was philosophy wrapped in the glory of a very human…

Books Literature 4 threads →

165 Verse

05 Jan 2026

I dwell in possibility

 Oooh, what a delightful collection of verse. Emily Dickinson is a goddamn genius. Sooo good.I DWELL in PossibilityA fairer house than Prose,More numerous of windows,Superior of doors.Of chambers, as the cedars— 

Poetry Emily Dickinson 4 threads →

163 Link

04 Jan 2026

Writing as a way to converse with yourself

I have come to see that writing has become a way for me to be in the deepest conversation with myself while also sensing the hovering presence of another. I don’t know who that other is – perhaps a gentle future reader. This personal conversation feels forbidden, in a way, given my work in journalism. But I find treasures in my thoughts and feelings, and I rush to put them on the page. Then a story takes shape and tells me…

Writing Literature 4 threads →

160 Verse

04 Jan 2026

A Psalm of Life

 [What a beautiful poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Psalm_of_Life)What the Heart of the Young Man Said to the Psalmist.A Psalm of LifeTell me not, in mournful numbers,Life is but an empty dream!—For the soul is dead that slumbers, 

153 Verse

01 Jan 2026

Gitanjali 48

source poets.org

 [Pure and sublime poetic beauty](https://poets.org/poem/gitanjali-48).The morning sea of silence broke into ripples of bird songs; and the flowers were all merry by the roadside; and the wealth of gold was scattered through the rift of the clouds while we busily went on our way and paid no heed.We sang no glad songs nor played; we went not to the village for barter; we spoke not a word nor smiled; we lingered not on the way. We quickened our pace more and more as the time sped by.The sun rose to the mid sky and doves cooed in the shade. Withered leaves danced and whirled in the hot air of noon. The shepherd boy drowsed and dreamed in the shadow of the banyan tree, and I laid myself down by the water and stretched my tired limbs on the grass.My companions laughed at me in scorn; they held their heads high and hurried on; they never looked back nor rested; they vanished in the distant blue haze. They crossed many meadows and hills, and passed through strange, far-away countries. All honour to you, heroic host of the interminable path! Mockery and reproach pricked me to rise, but found no response in me. I gave myself up for lost in the depth of a glad humiliation—in the shadow of a dim delight.The repose of the sun-embroidered green gloom slowly spread over my heart. I forgot for what I had travelled, and I surrendered my mind without struggle to the maze of shadows and songs. 

Rabindranath Tagore Poetry Spiritual 4 threads →

143 Verse

28 Dec 2025

Gitanjali 3 by Rabindranath Tagore

 God damn it, this is beautiful!I know not how thou singest, my master! I ever listen in silent amazement.The light of thy music illumines the world. The life breath of thy music runs from sky to sky. The holy stream of thy music breaks through all stony obstacles and rushes on.My heart longs to join in thy song, but vainly struggles for a voice. I would speak, but speech breaks not into song, and I cry out baffled. Ah, thou hast made my heart captive in the endless meshes of thy music, my master![From WikiSource](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Gitanjali/3). 

Poetry Rabindranath Tagore 4 threads →

140 Musing

26 Dec 2025

Another lament for literature

It was P.B. Shelley who once framed this faith with prophetic clarity: “Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world.” Literature, to him, was a subversive parliament of feeling — moving hearts, unsettling moral certainties, giving form to what was yet to be imagined. Today, that vision lies blurred. The poet, or novelist, or essayist is no longer a legislator but a content provider. What was once conjuration is now…

Literature 4 threads →

105 Musing

17 Nov 2025

Oral traditions in India

It would be wrong to apply Western theories of folk literature to India’s oral traditions, Kumar cautions readers. Local beliefs and worldviews seep into the songs and tales that evolve in any particular community. Moreover, in the telling of the tales and in the mode of singing as well, the local forms and styles inevitably exert an influence. This is why alien norms and paradigms cannot be imposed on indigenous modes of…

Literature Orality 4 threads →

097 Verse

08 Nov 2025

Evil by Arthur Rimbauld

 Ufff. What a poem. Each verse feels saturated with the bloody, neglected horrors of our own time — horrors I’m no doubt forcing into it, but can’t help seeing thereCouldn't stop hearing the echoes of the present.While loud the red-flecked mouths of cannons singAnd grapeshot whistles under empty sky;While, red and green, before each preening King,The massed battalions break, and thousands die; 

096 Verse

06 Nov 2025

Leviathan by George Oppen

 I came across George Oppen [in this article](https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v37/n12/ben-lerner/diary), and a random Google l[ed me to this poem](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/53221/leviathan-56d2325279712), and the only word that can succinctly capture my reaction is "dayum!"Truth also is the pursuit of it:Like happiness, and it will not stand.Even the verse begins to eat awayIn the acid. Pursuit, pursuit;A wind moves a little, 

091 Practical

01 Nov 2025

Dhwani: A directory for Indian public domain works

Built a small site to collect links to Indian literary and historical works in the public domain. While looking for books, I realized the sheer extent of our cultural apathy. Also, there are some amazing books just waiting to be read. Visit

Literature Intellectual life 4 threads →

Literature Culture Public domain 4 threads →

066 Reflection

14 Oct 2025

Odds and ends

The 'Instagram Generation' now experiences the present as an anticipated memory. - Daniel Kahneman

keep reading — 4 min ↗

063 Verse

11 Oct 2025

Rilke's advice to a young poet

 [From Letters to a Young poet by Rainer Maria Rilke](https://poets.org/text/letters-young-poet-first-letter):There is only one way: Go within. Search for the cause, find the impetus that bids you write. Put it to this test: Does it stretch out its roots in the deepest place of your heart? Can you avow that you would die if you were forbidden to write? Above all, in the most silent hour of your night, ask yourself this: Must I write? Dig deep into yourself for a true answer. And if it should ring its assent, if you can confidently meet this serious question with a simple, "I must," then build your life upon it. It has become your necessity. Your life, in even the most mundane and least significant hour, must become a sign, a testimony to this urge.Then draw near to nature. Pretend you are the very first man and then write what you see and experience, what you love and lose. Do not write love poems, at least at first; they present the greatest challenge. It requires great, fully ripened power to produce something personal, something unique, when there are so many good and sometimes even brilliant renditions in great numbers. Beware of general themes. Cling to those that your every- day life offers you. Write about your sorrows, your wishes, your passing thoughts, your belief in anything beautiful. Describe all that with fervent, quiet, and humble sincerity. In order to express yourself, use things in your surroundings, the scenes of your dreams, and the subjects of your memory. 

Poetry Rilke Writing 4 threads →

061 Verse

09 Oct 2025

Meditation by Charles Baudelaire

 Beautiful.Take it easy, Sadness. Settle down.You asked for evening. Now, it’s come. It’s here.A choking fog has blanketed the town,infecting some with calm, the rest with fear.While the squalid throng of mortals feels the sting 

051 Verse

28 Sept 2025

The day is gone by John Keats

 Beautiful poem.The day is gone, and all its sweets are gone!Sweet voice, sweet lips, soft hand, and softer breast,Warm breath, light whisper, tender semi-tone,Bright eyes, accomplish'd shape, and lang'rous waist!Faded the flower and all its budded charms, 

044 Verse

21 Sept 2025

Wild Geese by Mary Oliver

 Beautiful.You do not have to be good.You do not have to walk on your kneesFor a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.You only have to let the soft animal of your bodylove what it loves. 

040 Verse

15 Sept 2025

The Second Coming by William Butler Yeats

 Damn. What a powerful poem. If there was ever a poem for the present moment.Turning and turning in the widening gyreThe falcon cannot hear the falconer;Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere 

033 Verse

07 Sept 2025

Poetry is a salve for the soul

 [A beautiful perspective on what poetry can do for us by Leila Chatti](https://lithub.com/on-not-writing-and-letting-wildness-be-your-guide):I have always put my faith in poetry, have come to it for answers. (I have never understood the shame, in poets, in admitting this.) And there was no one else, then, to turn to—the world closed, I lived inside a room of books. This is not metaphor.Sequestered in my personal library, wildered by grief, I looked to the poets who had all my life guided me. Those women who, like oracles, spoke the true thing. Godmouthed. Who had seen what was and would be. And said it strange.Oracle: from the Latin _orare._ To pray or to speak. Surely they lived as I did. Needing to write poems, in order to do both at the same time.I approached their poems like the prophecies of oracles—something to be deciphered, the message cryptic. The oracle at Delphi was originally a girl, then later a woman over the age of fifty. Her title: Pythia. My mind sees this and instinctively reads it as code, rearranging its letters: Sylvia Plath. It was with her work I began, first woman poet I encountered on my way to becoming one. Poet who spoke the unsayable thoughts I could not name and had believed were mine alone.Poet: from the Greek _poietes._ Maker. 

026 Verse

31 Aug 2025

The heart wants what it wants

 I learned that the famous line "The heart wants what it wants" is from a famous letter by Emily Dickinson and not Woody Allen.The full line:Dear Mary -When the Best is gone - I know that other things are not of consequence - The Heart wants what it wants - or else it does not care -You wonder why I write - so - Because I cannot help - I like to have you know some care - so when your life gets faint for it’s other life - you can lean on us - We wont break, Mary. We look very small - but the Reed can carry weight.[Read the letter here.](https://paperlanterns.ink/letter/dickinson-mary-bowles-1862/) 

Letters Poetry 4 threads →

014 Verse

18 Aug 2025

The greatest anonymous poem

 I heard about the poem _“Tom o’ Bedlam”_ in an [interview with Harold Bloom](https://www.rabbitholes.garden/posts/2025-08-17-why-read). He called it _“the greatest anonymous lyric poem in English,”_ and he’s not wrong. I’ve reread it multiple times, and what stands out is its steadily increasing intensity, culminating in that stunning crescendo at the end. The poem is written in Early Modern English, so I asked Gemini to explain it to me line by line.“Tom o’ Bedlam” is a haunting and powerful anonymous English folk ballad from the 17th century. It’s sung from the perspective of a “Tom o’ Bedlam,” a licensed beggar who was formerly an inmate of the Bethlehem Royal Hospital (Bedlam), a notorious mental asylum in London. These former patients were given a special license to beg for food and money, often carrying a distinctive horn to identify themselves. The poem is a mix of fantastical rants, social commentary, and a deep-seated sadness.**Here is the full poem, followed by a line-by-line interpretation:**From the hag and hungry goblinThat into rags would rend ye,The spirit that stands by the naked man 

keep reading — 8 min ↗