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Elizabeth Bishop

Elizabeth Bishop Books

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Poems

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North and South

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One Art: Letters

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“The tumult in the heart keeps asking questions. And then it stops and undertakes to answer in the same tone of voice. No one could tell the difference. Uninnocent, these conversations start, and then engage the senses, only half-meaning to. And then there is no choice, and then there is no sense; until a name and all its connotation are the same.”

LoveDesirePoetryRelationshipsCommunicationThoughtIntrospection
Book:The Complete Poems 1927-1979
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“I have seen it over and over, the same sea, the same, slightly, indifferently swinging above the stones, icily free above the stones, above the stones and then the world. If you should dip your hand in, your wrist would ache immediately, your bones would begin to ache and your hand would burn as if the water were a transmutation of fire that feeds on stones and burns with a dark gray flame. If you tasted it, it would first taste bitter, then briny, then surely burn your tongue. It is like what we imagine knowledge to be: dark, salt, clear, moving, utterly free, drawn form the cold hard mouth of the world, derived from the rocky breasts forever, flowing and drawn, and since our knowledge is historical, flowing, and flown.”

PoetryAt The Fishouses
Book:North and South
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“I caught a tremendous fish and held him beside the boat half out of water, with my hook fast in a corner of his mouth. He didn't fight. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I stared and stared and victory filled up the little rented boat from the pool of bilge where oil had spread a rainbow around the rusted engine to the bailer rusted orange, the sun-cracked thwarts the oarlocks on their strings, the gunnels-until everything was rainbow, rainbow, rainbow! And I let the fish go.”

LittlesFightingWaterHalfSunVictoryMouthsFilledCaughtFishesCornersSpreadOilBoatStringsEnginesPoolRainbowOrangeHookCrackedFilled Up
Author:Elizabeth Bishop
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“Dreams were the worst. Of course I dreamed of food and love, but they were pleasant rather than otherwise. But then I'd dream of things like slitting a baby's throat, mistaking it for a baby goat. I'd have nightmares of other islands stretching away from mine, infinities of islands, islands spawning islands, like frogs' eggs turning into polliwogs of islands, knowing that I had to live on each and every one, eventually, for ages, registering their flora, their fauna, their geography.”

DreamAgeCoursesKnowingWorstMinesBabyAnd LoveIslandsPleasantNightmareEggsThroatInfinityGeographyFrogsStretchingGoatsFloraFood And Love
Book:Geography III: Poems
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“I am in need of music that would flow Over my fretful, feeling finger-tips, Over my bitter-tainted, trembling lips, With melody, deep, clear, and liquid-slow. Oh, for the healing swaying, old and low, Of some song sung to rest the tired dead, A song to fall like water on my head, And over quivering limbs, dream flushed to glow! There is a magic made by melody: A spell of rest, and quiet breath, and cool Heart, that sinks through fading colors deep To the subaqueous stillness of the sea, And floats forever in a moon-green pool, Held in the arms of rhythm and of sleep.”

NeedsHeartMadeFeelingsDreamSongFallWaterSleepHealingForeverClearMagicSeaColorArmsQuietMoonLowsFlowBreathsGreenTiredFingersLipsBitterRhythmMelodySpellsPoolStillnessLimbsFloatsLiquidTremblingFadingTaintedSwaying
Book:Elizabeth Bishop: Poems, Prose, and Letters
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“It was cold and windy, scarcely the day to take a walk on that long beach Everything was withdrawn as far as possible, indrawn: the tide far out, the ocean shrunken, seabirds in ones or twos. The rackety, icy, offshore wind numbed our faces on one side; disrupted the formation of a lone flight of Canada geese; and blew back the low, inaudible rollers in upright, steely mist.”

LongFacesSidesWalksWindColdOceanSpringLowsFlightBeachCanadaMarchTidesMistFormationSpringtimeGeeseLoneIcyWindyOffshoreLong Beach
Book:Elizabeth Bishop: Poems, Prose, and Letters
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“Bishop on "At the Fishhouses"At the last minute, after I'd had a chance to do a little research in Cape Breton, I foundI'd said codfish scales once when it should have been herring scales. I hope theycorrected it all right.2Quite a few lines of "At the Fishhouses" came to me in a dream, and the scene- whichwas real enough, I'd recently been there-but the old man and the conversation, etc.,were all in a later dream”

MenShouldLittlesHas BeensSaidRealEnoughDreamLastsLinesChanceMinutesSceneConversationResearchShould HaveScalesEtcOld ManShould Have BeenBishopsCapesLast MinuteHerringCape Breton
Author:Elizabeth Bishop
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