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Home  »  Poetry: A Magazine of Verse  »  Emanuel Carnevali

Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.

Sermon

Emanuel Carnevali

From “Neuriade”

CHAO-MONG-MU freely laid his hands over the sky:

You do not know how to lay your hands over the breasts of your beloved.

Chao-Mong-Mu made the tree dance at his will:

You do not know how to hug a rough tree and say “darling” to it.

Chao-Mong-Mu magnificently ran a shaft of sunlight to smash against the treetops:

You walk carefully, carefully, and fend off the sunlight with your grey clothes, although you’re very poor.

Chao-Mong-Mu painted a sky that was a pink-fleshed vase; then he became a very small thing and hid in the vase:

You build yourselves immense houses to live in, and you are afraid even there.