Path

Near the open road
And woods under the snow
A point that lifts the night
A lamp keeps watch
Upon the white face
the lowered eyelids
Upon the bare wall
the closed shutters
Ruts in the soil come together
The bridge nearer
And cubes all about
Shapes
Objects
The mystery of doors
We step across emotion barring the road
And without turning we continue onward
The house will not follow
The house is watching us
From between two trees
its red topknot
and white brow
Silence lingers.

- Pierre Reverdy

About Poet:

Pierre Reverdy was a French poet associated with surrealism and cubism.Reverdy arrived in Paris in October 1910. It was there, at the famous Bateau-Lavoir in Montmartre that he met Guillaume Apollinaire, Max Jacob, Louis Aragon, André Breton, Philippe Soupault and Tristan Tzara. For sixteen years, Reverdy lived for his writing. His companions were Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Henri Matisse and many others. These were the years in which surrealism took flight and Reverdy partly inspired it. In the first Surrealist Manifesto, André Breton hailed Reverdy as "the greatest poet of the time,"

Butterfly

Speed is violence

The butterly seeks safety in lightness
In weightless, undulating flight

But at a crossroads where mottled light
From trees falls on a brash new highway
Our convergent territories meet

I come power-packed enough for two

And the gentle butterfly offers

Itself in bright yellow sacrifice

Upon my hard silicon shield.

About Poet:

Albert Chinualumogu Achebe is a Nigerian novelist, poet, and critic. He is best known for his first novel, Things Fall Apart (1959), which is the most widely-read book in modern African literature. Achebe has been called "the father of modern African writing", and many books and essays have been written about his work over the past fifty years. In 1992, he became the first living author to be represented in the Everyman's Library collection published by Alfred A. Knopf.