(Poem #27)Song Against Natural Selection The weak survive! A man with a damaged arm, a house missing a single brick, one step torn away from the other steps the way I was once torn away from you; this hurts us, it isn't what we'd imagined, what we'd hoped for when we were young and still hoping for, still imagining things, but we manage, we survive. Sure, losing is hard work, one limb severed at a time makes it that much harder to get around the city, another word dropped from our vocabularies and the remaining words are that much heavier on our tongues, that much further from ourselves, and yet people go on talking, speech survives. It isn't easy giving up limbs, trying to manage with that much less to eat each week, that much more money we know we'll never make, things we not only can't buy, but can't afford to look at in the stores; this hurts us, and yet we manage, we survive so that losing itself becomes a kind of song, our song, our only witness to the way we die, one day at a time; a leg severed, a word buried: this is how we recognize ourselves, and why. |
Song Against Natural Selection -- Edward Hirsch
Against Entropy -- John M Ford
(Poem #26)Against Entropy The worm drives helically through the wood And does not know the dust left in the bore Once made the table integral and good; And suddenly the crystal hits the floor. Electrons find their paths in subtle ways, A massless eddy in a trail of smoke; The names of lovers, light of other days Perhaps you will not miss them. That's the joke. The universe winds down. That's how it's made. But memory is everything to lose; Although some of the colors have to fade, Do not believe you'll get the chance to choose. Regret, by definition, comes too late; Say what you mean. Bear witness. Iterate. |
The Wild Geese -- Wendell Berry
(Poem #25)The Wild Geese Horseback on Sunday morning, harvest over, we taste persimmon and wild grape, sharp sweet of summer's end. In time's maze over fall fields, we name names that went west from here, names that rest on graves. We open a persimmon seed to find the tree that stands in promise, pale, in the seed's marrow. Geese appear high over us, pass, and the sky closes. Abandon, as in love or sleep, holds them to their way, clear, in the ancient faith: what we need is here. And we pray, not for new earth or heaven, but to be quiet in heart, and in eye clear. What we need is here. |
I Love You Sweatheart -- Thomas Lux
(Poem #24)I Love You Sweatheart A man risked his life to write the words. A man hung upside down (an idiot friend holding his legs?) with spray paint to write the words on a girder fifty feet above a highway. And his beloved, the next morning driving to work...? His words are not (meant to be) so unique. Does she recognize his handwriting? Did he hint to her at her doorstep the night before of "something special, darling, tomorrow"? And did he call her at work expecting her to faint with delight at his celebration of her, his passion, his risk? She will know I love her now, the world will know my love for her! A man risked his life to write the words. Love is like this at the bone, we hope, love is like this, Sweatheart, all sore and dumb and dangerous, ignited, blessed -- always, regardless, no exceptions, always in blazing matters like these: blessed. |
Casabianca -- Elizabeth Bishop
(Poem #23)Casabianca Love's the boy stood on the burning deck trying to recite "The boy stood on the burning deck". Love's the son stood stammering elocution while the poor ship in flames went down. Love's the obstinate boy, the ship, even the swimming sailors, who would like a schoolroom platform, too or an excuse to stay on deck. And love's the burning boy. |
Acquainted with the Night -- Robert Frost
(Poem #22)Acquainted with the Night 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-bye; And further still at an unearthly height, O luminary clock against the sky Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right. I have been one acquainted with the night. |
It Isn't Time That's Passing -- Ruskin Bond
(Poem #21)It Isn't Time That's Passing Remember the long ago when we lay together In a pain of tenderness and counted Our dreams: long summer afternoons When the whistling-thrush released A deep sweet secret on the trembling air; Blackbird on the wing, bird of the forest shadows, Black rose in the long ago summer, This was your song: It isn't time that's passing by, It is you and I. |
Where We Are -- Stephen Dobyns
(Poem #20)Where We Are A man tears a chunk of bread off the brown loaf, then wipes the gravy from his plate. Around him at the long table, friends fill their mouths with duck and roast pork, fill their cups from pitchers of wine. Hearing a high twittering, the man looks to see a bird— black with a white patch beneath its beak— flying the length of the hall, having flown in by a window over the door. As straight as a taut string, the bird flies beneath the roofbeams, as firelight flings its shadow against the ceiling. The man pauses— one hand holds the bread, the other rests upon the table— and watches the bird, perhaps a swift, fly toward the window at the far end of the room. He begins to point it out to his friends, but one is telling hunting stories, as another describes the best way to butcher a pig. The man shoves the bread in his mouth, then slaps his hand down hard on the thigh of the woman seated beside him, squeezes his fingers to feel the firm muscles and tendons beneath the fabric of her dress. A huge dog snores on the stone hearth by the fire. From the window comes the clicking of pine needles blown against it by an October wind. A half moon hurries along behind scattered clouds, while the forest of black spruce and bare maple and birch surrounds the long hall the way a single rock can be surrounded by a river. This is where we are in history— to think the table will remain full; to think the forest will remain where we have pushed it; to think our bubble of good fortune will save us from the night— a bird flies in from the dark, flits across a lighted hall and disappears. |