We don’t die,  we merely  cease to be alive
Though the body looks the same to  strangers
From this truth, all other  thoughts must be  derived

Though the anguish in our  bosoms ever writhes
All the  sacraments of death  and law arranged
We don’t die,  we merely  cease to be alive

To hide these  blatant truths, society connives.
We weep and moan and we are called deranged
From this truth, all other  thoughts must be  derived

The loss is like a stabbing  with some fearsome knives
Though we sensed the presence of the  angels.
We don’t die,  we merely  cease to be alive

God has turn asunder  gentle man and wife
Some say, you start  another newer page
From this truth, all other  thoughts must be  derived

We don’t die,  we merely  cease to be alive.
From this truth, all other  thoughts must be  derived

I have listened to the arguments of fools
I have heard them like a donkey bray
I have looked within and found dark jewels.

I have studied  algebra like Boole’s
I read the works of Euclid and  obeyed
I have listened to the arguments of fools.

I have  been to colleges and schools
I have seen the wolves therein who prey.
I have looked within and found dark jewels

I have earned my knowledge and my tools
I have kept them current day by day
I have listened to the arguments of  fools

I have loved strange men whom I thought cool
I have often felt the need to pray
I have looked within and found dark jewels

So we each must fumble  through the day
Knowledge and perception show the way
I have listened to the arguments of fools
I have looked within and found dark jewels.

The point of living is to feel alive
Not caged  by  too high walls or steely fence
We want to love,be taken by surprise.

Our  wounded mangled self we can’t deride,
Recalling  fights and  struggles lived  through once.
The point of living is to feel alive.

We dither to and fro in puzzled ways
We feel the anguish, still and quite intent.
We want to love,be taken by surprise.

The self’s spontaneous, not a thing contrived;
Formed with love and  hate,with all intense.
The rage of living is to be alive.

When washed away by feelings glad,immense
That cross our borders without our lament
The  hope,the need of living is  our life
We want to  give and take  yet fear surprise

I have  heard  grass singing in  the wind.
I   have walked through poppy fields in  sun
I have  suffered  when dark rain descends

I have watched  trees’ shadows in the ponds
I have  known the  arctic wastes of pain
I have  heard  grass singing in the wind.

Another soul is writing  with my hand
Yet I have  wept  while loaning him  my pen
I have  suffered  when dark rain descends

I have known  the edges  of the mind
I ‘ve   sensed  hollow silence un-contained.
I have  heard  grass singing in  the wind.

I have sorrowed for  humans confined
I have  watched  the antics  of bad  men
I have  suffered  when dark rain descends

I have seen the storm by camera lens.
I have felt the   solar system bend.
I have  heard  grass singing in  the wind.
I have  suffered  when dark rain descends

The gift for  imitation   is an art
Needs eyes and face and mind to work as one;
And who would dare to play the darkest parts?

To reproduce another being’s heart;
To manifest a self  till acting’s done.
The gift for imitation is an art

To  play another, may one’s soul contort;
Although a little demon may be fun.
But who would dare to play the darkest part?

I’d sooner play a demon than a tart
Especially if I had a  piper and a drum
The gift for imitation, oh,  what art.

When we play  adult games we have no charts
And we know too many use a gun
But who would  dare to play the darkest parts?

We  face a trump and devils may become
Our fellow citizens   till all’s undone.
The  gift for  imitation   is an art
Yet  will  he dare to play the darkest part?

350th Anniversary of Harvard

The sin a child is born  to is not hers;
For mother’s body’s sacred  with its grace.
The sin a child is born to,it is ours

Yet ,at a baptism will the priest declare:
Out ye demons,leave this infant’s space.
The sin a child is born  to is not hers

 
The infant  naturally speaks in tongues of fire.
The Spirit moves eternal in its trace
The sin a child is born to,it is ours

The path we learn to walk ‘s already there
The rules  and laws were written with no haste
The sin  a child is born to is not hers

A child born now  is marked by Iraq War
A child born now, in paranoia’s traced.
The sin a child is born to,it is ours

Oh,look upon the infant’s holy face
Beatific vision is there  traced
The sin a child is born  to is not hers
The sin a child is born to,it is ours

I have walked the silent paths of grief
Sunless,dreary,cold and all alone.
I have slept on beds of winter leaves.

I know that death’s an avaricious thief.
Although my heart weeps and my joy has gone.
I have never felt I was deceived.

I have learned that human life is brief.
I have learned by sorrow we’re undone.
I have sifted earth and what’s beneath.

I felt dark emotions in me seethe
While I have been mocked by glaring sun.
I have learned the geography of grief.

I wait in silence for this life to cease
Or will a fluttering wing make chaos come,
Change my heart and give me a fresh lease?

Unconsoled grief can make us dumb
Into our hearts, we drag the ice that numbs
I have walked the silent paths of grief
I have made my bed on winter leaves.

Both mean not having, but one means missing too.
Absence can be welcome, but lack implies desire—
the absence of some noise, a lack of you

might be a good example. And it’s true
that lack makes judgment, means that we require
the thing that’s gone (a constant aching, too)

while absence just reports; we can make do
with smaller things; it doesn’t sound so dire.
Who needs the noise? (But I need you.)

Absence lets us start anew,
while lacking keeps us laced to its dark pyre.
Both are not having, but one is missing too,

and wanting nothing more than to undo
whatever sins caused lacking to transpire.
The noise is done, and so, I guess, are you

with me. In verse I struggle to subdue
my restless heart. (The lacking makes me tired.)
Both mean not having; one means missing too—
the absence of some noise, a lack of you.

Annie Diamond is a student at Barnard College, a private women’s liberal arts college affiliated with Columbia University. She has also studied abroad at Mansfield College, one of the constituent colleges of Oxford University in England. She recently completed her sophomore year at Barnard College, where she studies English and creative writing. Her work has been published in Apt, Avatar Review, Clockwise Cat, The Columbia Review and The Lyric. She was awarded first prize in The Lyric‘s College Poetry Contest for her villanelle “The Difference Between Lack and Absence.” The same poem later won the Lyric Memorial Prize and was named the best poem to appear in The Lyric for the year 2013. Her favorite writing spot is the Hungarian Pastry Shop on New York City’s 111th Street, and her number one life ambition is to appear on Jeopardy.

“It was my honor and pleasure to judge The Lyric‘s yearly and quarterly awards. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that my favorite poem for the year 2013 was written by a college student, Annie Diamond. I believe she has a very bright future.”—Michael R. Burch

I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in rain—and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat
And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet
When far away an interrupted cry
Came over houses from another street,

But not to call me back or say good-by;
And further still at an unearthly height,
One luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right.
I have been one acquainted with the night.

Robert Frost’s “Acquainted With The Night” is more of a sonnet than a villanelle, but it is a marvellous poem with a killer opening line that doubles as a killer closing line.