Poetry

These three and death – all the inspiration 

you need to write a poem.  Keep your 

many-named flowers, your adornments 

of nature, leave your moralizing tongue, 

the contemporary dust – substantial as air, 

as voice, as breath.  Keep your misgivings, 

your truths, your illusions.  All you need 

are senseless repetition, madness, and silence 

– and death, do not forget her, moveable feast.

echolalia, madness, and silence
Introduction from “Last Poems” Paul Celan
Katharine Washburn