(Poem #196)Ring Out, Wild Bells Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, The flying cloud, the frosty light; The year is dying in the night; Ring out, wild bells, and let him die. Ring out the old, ring in the new, Ring, happy bells, across the snow: The year is going, let him go; Ring out the false, ring in the true. Ring out the grief that saps the mind, For those that here we see no more, Ring out the feud of rich and poor, Ring in redress to all mankind. Ring out a slowly dying cause, And ancient forms of party strife; Ring in the nobler modes of life, With sweeter manners, purer laws. Ring out the want, the care the sin, The faithless coldness of the times; Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes, But ring the fuller minstrel in. Ring out false pride in place and blood, The civic slander and the spite; Ring in the love of truth and right, Ring in the common love of good. Ring out old shapes of foul disease, Ring out the narrowing lust of gold; Ring out the thousand wars of old, Ring in the thousand years of peace. Ring in the valiant man and free, The larger heart, the kindlier hand; Ring out the darkenss of the land, Ring in the Christ that is to be. |
Ring Out, Wild Bells -- Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Sit -- Vikram Seth
(Poem #195)Sit Sit, drink your coffee here; your work can wait awhile. You're twenty-six, and still have some of life ahead. No need for wit; just talk vacuities, and I'll Reciprocate in kind, or laugh at you instead. The world is too opaque, distressing and profound. This twenty minutes' rendezvous will make my day: To sit here in the sun, with grackles all around, Staring with beady eyes, and you two feet away. |
Poem for Salt -- Leroy V. Quintana
(Poem #194)Poem for Salt The biggest snowstorm to hit Denver in twenty years.
What is the world to do, freed from the shackles
of the eight hours needed to earn its daily salary?
Only on a day such as this does salt overshadow gold.
Salt, with its lips of blue fire, common as gossip,
ordinary as sin. Like true love and gasoline,
missed only when they run out. Salt spilling
from a blue container a young girl is holding,
along with an umbrella, on the label of a blue
container of salt that the woman across the street,
under her umbrella is pouring behind her left rear wheel,
to no avail this discontented, unbuttoned December
morning.
|
The Face in the Toyota -- Robert Bly
(Poem #193)The Face in the Toyota Suppose you see a face in a Toyota One day, and you fall in love with that face, And it is Her, and the world rushes by Like dust blown down a Montana street. And you fall upward into some deep hole, And you can't tell God from a grain of sand. And your life is changed, except that now you Overlook even more than you did before; And these ignored things come to bury you, And you are crushed, and your parents Can't help you anymore, and the woman in the Toyota Becomes a part of the world that you don't see. And now the grain of sand becomes sand again, And you stand on some mountain road weeping. |
Winter '84 -- Krisantha Sri Bhaggiyadatta
(Poem #192)Winter '84 I tell the corner store owner 'pretty cold out there' he says 'ain't what it used to be' 'oh', i say, 'why is that' innocently tensing wondering if coloured immigration has affected the seasons... 'they've been fooling around with the weather', he says. [his wife nods] 'ever since they sent a man to the moon it hasn't been right' oh, i say, breathing out intrigued 'yeah, i know what you mean' |
Before Dawn in October -- Julia Kasdorf
(Poem #191)Before Dawn in October The window frame catches a draft that smells of dead leaves and wet street, and I wrap arms around my knees, look down on these small breasts, so my spine forms a curve as perfect as the rim of the moon. I want to tell the man sleeping curled as a child beside me that this futon is a raft. The moon and tiny star we call sun are the parents who at last approve of us. For once, we haven't borrowed more than we can return. Stars above our cement backyard are as sharp as those that shine far from Brooklyn, and we are not bound for anything worse than we can imagine, as long as we turn on the kitchen lamp and light a flame under the pot, as long as we sip coffee from beautiful China-blue cups and love the steam of the shower and thrusting our feet into trousers. As long as we walk down our street in sun that ignites red leaves on the maple, we will see faces on the subway and know we may take our places somewhere among them. |
Light, at Thirty-Two -- Michael Blumenthal
(Poem #190)Light, at Thirty-Two It is the first thing God speaks of when we meet Him, in the good book of Genesis. And now, I think I see it all in terms of light: How, the other day at dusk on Ossabaw Island, the marsh grass was the color of the most beautiful hair I had ever seen, or how—years ago in the early-dawn light of Montrose Park— I saw the most ravishing woman in the world, only to find, hours later over drinks in a dark bar, that it wasn't she who was ravishing, but the light: how it filtered through the leaves of the magnolia onto her cheeks, how it turned her cotton dress to silk, her walk to a tour-jeté. And I understood, finally, what my friend John meant, twenty years ago, when he said: Love is keeping the lights on. And I understood why Matisse and Bonnard and Gauguin and Cézanne all followed the light: Because they knew all lovers are equal in the dark, that light defines beauty the way longing defines desire, that everything depends on how light falls on a seashell, a mouth ... a broken bottle. And now, I'd like to learn to follow light wherever it leads me, never again to say to a woman, YOU are beautiful, but rather to whisper: Darling, the way light fell on your hair This morning when we woke—God, It was beautiful. Because, if the light is right, Then the day and the body and the faint pleasures Waiting at the window ... they too are right. All things lovely there. As the first poet wrote, in his first book of poems: Let there be light. And there is. |
Glow -- Ron Padgett
(Poem #189)Glow When I wake up earlier than you and you are turned to face me, face on the pillow and hair spread around, I take a chance and stare at you, amazed in love and afraid that you might open your eyes and have the daylights scared out of you. But maybe with the daylights gone you'd see how much my chest and head implode for you, their voices trapped inside like unborn children fearing they will never see the light of day. The opening in the wall now dimly glows its rainy blue and gray. I tie my shoes and go downstairs to put the coffee on. |
What Do I Care? -- Sara Teasdale
(Poem #188)What Do I Care? What do I care, in the dreams and the languor of spring, That my songs do not show me at all? For they are a fragrance, and I am a flint and a fire, I am an answer, they are only a call. But what do I care, for love will be over so soon, Let my heart have its say and my mind stand idly by, For my mind is proud and strong enough to be silent, It is my heart that makes my songs, not I. |
Dreams -- Robert Herrick
(Poem #187)Dreams Here we are all, by day; by night we're hurled By dreams, each one, into a several world. |
At a Lecture -- Joseph Brodsky
(Poem #186)At a Lecture Since mistakes are inevitable, I can easily be taken for a man standing before you in this room filled with yourselves. Yet in about an hour this will be corrected, at your and at my expense, and the place will be reclaimed by elemental particles free from the rigidity of a particular human shape or type of assembly. Some particles are still free. It's not all dust. So my unwillingness to admit it's I facing you now, or the other way around, has less to do with my modesty or solipsism than with my respect for the premises' instant future, for those afore-mentioned free-floating particles settling upon the shining surface of my brain. Inaccessible to a wet cloth eager to wipe them off. The most interesting thing about emptiness is that it is preceded by fullness. The first to understand this were, I believe, the Greek gods, whose forte indeed was absence. Regard, then, yourselves as rehearsing perhaps for the divine encore, with me playing obviously to the gallery. We all act out of vanity. But I am in a hurry. Once you know the future, you can make it come earlier. The way it's done by statues or by one's furniture. Self-effacement is not a virtue but a necessity, recognised most often toward evening. Though numerically it is easier not to be me than not to be you. As the swan confessed to the lake: I don't like myself. But you are welcome to my reflection. |
Long Distance II -- Tony Harrison
(Poem #185)Long Distance II Though my mother was already two years dead Dad kept her slippers warming by the gas, put hot water bottles her side of the bed and still went to renew her transport pass. You couldn't just drop in. You had to phone. He'd put you off an hour to give him time to clear away her things and look alone as though his still raw love were such a crime. He couldn't risk my blight of disbelief though sure that very soon he'd hear her key scrape in the rusted lock and end his grief. He knew she'd just popped out to get the tea. I believe life ends with death, and that is all. You haven't both gone shopping; just the same, in my new black leather phone book there's your name and the disconnected number I still call. |
Waking Elsewhere -- Cecilia Woloch
(Poem #184)Waking Elsewhere I woke up dreaming my mother's garden— fields in autumn, green turning gold, grasses scythed down in the late, dark sun; and here will be corn, she was saying, tomatoes, flowers I never knew she loved. I woke to a child climbing into my bed —four-year-old girl of my sister's son— hair like silk and the color of wheat falling into her eyes, begging me to get up. And in my mother's kitchen the strong light smelled of coffee and autumn, in fact. In fact, my mother, who hasn't gardened in twenty years, was taking a bath. I heard her splashing through the walls. It was October; the child came forward, one fresh egg cupped in her palm. I woke up dreaming the harrowed fields, sharp with stubble, my mother's lands. She was already preparing for spring; she was already stepping naked from the bath, away from grief— a widow with work to do, weeds in the yard, and the child calling softly to me, come on, come on, come on. |
I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud -- William Wordsworth
(Poem #183)I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud I wandered lonely as a cloud That floats on high o'er vales and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host, of golden daffodils; Beside the lake, beneath the trees, Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. Continuous as the stars that shine And twinkle on the milky way, They stretched in never-ending line Along the margin of a bay: Ten thousand saw I at a glance, Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. The waves beside them danced; but they Out-did the sparkling waves in glee: A poet could not but be gay, In such a jocund company: I gazed—and gazed—but little thought What wealth the show to me had brought: For oft, when on my couch I lie In vacant or in pensive mood, They flash upon that inward eye Which is the bliss of solitude; And then my heart with pleasure fills, And dances with the daffodils. |
Litany -- Billy Collins
[BC] This is another poem that involves lifting lines, and in this case I took two lines not just out of the middle of the poem but actually took the first two lines of someone else’s poem and essentially re-wrote the poem
for him (laughter). This is a professional courtesy. I came across this poem in a magazine, it’s a love poem, and it just seemed to suffer from a very outdated theory about how to approach women in poetry that male
poets were laboring under. The assumption was that what women really wanted more than anything in life was not loyalty, or passion, or fidelity, or respect – they just wanted similes. You know, they just wanted to be
compared to stuff (continued laughter).
(Poem #182)Litany You are the bread and the knife,
The crystal goblet and the wine...
-Jacques Crickillon
You are the bread and the knife,
the crystal goblet and the wine.
You are the dew on the morning grass
and the burning wheel of the sun.
You are the white apron of the baker,
and the marsh birds suddenly in flight.
However, you are not the wind in the orchard,
the plums on the counter,
or the house of cards.
And you are certainly not the pine-scented air.
There is just no way that you are the pine-scented air.
It is possible that you are the fish under the bridge,
maybe even the pigeon on the general's head,
but you are not even close
to being the field of cornflowers at dusk.
And a quick look in the mirror will show
that you are neither the boots in the corner
nor the boat asleep in its boathouse.
It might interest you to know,
speaking of the plentiful imagery of the world,
that I am the sound of rain on the roof.
I also happen to be the shooting star,
the evening paper blowing down an alley
and the basket of chestnuts on the kitchen table.
I am also the moon in the trees
and the blind woman's tea cup.
But don't worry, I'm not the bread and the knife.
You are still the bread and the knife.
You will always be the bread and the knife,
not to mention the crystal goblet and--somehow--the wine.
|
Sitting All Evening Alone in the Kitchen -- Ted Kooser
(Poem #181)Sitting All Evening Alone in the Kitchen The cat has fallen asleep, the dull book of a dead moth loose in its paws. The moon in the window, the tide gurgling out through the broken shells in the old refrigerator. Late, I turn out the lights. The little towns on top of the stove glow faintly neon, sad women alone at the bar. |
In an Artist's Studio -- Christina Rossetti
(Poem #180)In an Artist's Studio One face looks out from all his canvasses, One selfsame figure sits or walks or leans; We found her hidden just behind those screens, That mirror gave back all her loveliness. A queen in opal or in ruby dress, A nameless girl in freshest summer greens, A saint, an angel--every canvass means The same one meaning, neither more nor less. He feeds upon her face by day and night, And she with true kind eyes looks back on him Fair as the moon and joyfull as the light; Not wan with waiting, not with sorrow dim; Not as she is, but was when hope shone bright; Not as she is, but as she fills his dream. |
Hope -- Emily Dickinson
(Poem #179)Hope Hope is the thing with feathers That perches in the soul, And sings the tune--without the words, And never stops at all, And sweetest in the gale is heard; And sore must be the storm That could abash the little bird That kept so many warm. I've heard it in the chillest land, And on the strangest sea; Yet, never, in extremity, It asked a crumb of me. |
He wishes for the cloths of heaven -- William Butler Yeats
(Poem #178)He wishes for the cloths of heaven Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths, Enwrought with golden and silver light, The blue and the dim and the dark cloths Of night and light and the half-light, I would spread the cloths under your feet: But I, being poor, have only my dreams; I have spread my dreams under your feet; Tread softly, because you tread on my dreams. |
Fast Food -- Richard Thompson
(Poem #177)Fast Food Big mac, small mac, burger and fries Shove 'em in boxes all the same size Easy on the mustard, heavy on the sauce Double for the fat boy, eats like a horse. Fry them patties and send 'em right through Microwave oven going to fry me too Can't lose my job by getting in a rage Got to get my hands on that minimum wage. Shove it in their faces, give 'em what they want Got to make it fast, it's a Fast Food Restaurant. Shake's full of plastic, meat's full of worms Everything's zapped so you won't get germs Water down the ketchup, easier to pour on Pictures on the register in case you're a moron. Keep your uniform clean, don't talk back Blood down your shirt going to get you the sack Sugar, grease, fats and starches Fine to dine at the golden arches. Shove it in their faces, give 'em what they want Got to make it fast, it's a Fast Food Restaurant. Baby thrown up, booth number 9 Wash it down, hose it down, happens all the time Cigarettes in the coffee, contact lens in the tea I'd rather feed pigs than humanity. Shove it in their faces, give 'em what they want Got to make it fast, it's a Fast Food Restaurant. |
Love Like Salt -- Lisel Mueller
(Poem #176)Love Like Salt It lies in our hands in crystals too intricate to decipher It goes into the skillet without being given a second thought It spills on the floor so fine we step all over it We carry a pinch behind each eyeball It breaks out on our foreheads We store it inside our bodies in secret wineskins At supper, we pass it around the table talking of holidays and the sea. |
Headlines -- Robert Phillips
(Poem #175)Headlines War Dims Hope for Peace. Plane Too Close to Ground, Crash Probe Told. Clinton Wins Budget; More Lies Ahead. Miners Refuse to Work after Death. Include Your Children When Baking Cookies. War Dims Hope for Peace. Something Went Wrong in Jet Crash, Experts Say Prostitutes Appeal to Pope. Clinton Wins Budget; More Lies Ahead. Local High School Dropouts Cut in Half. Couple Slain; Police Suspect Homicide. War Dims Hope for Peace. Stolen Painting Found by Tree. Panda Mating Fails; Veterinarian Takes Over. Clinton Wins Budget; More Lies Ahead. Iraqi Head Seeks Arms. Police Campaign to Run Down Jaywalkers. War Dims Hope for Peace. Clinton Wins Budget; More Lies Ahead |
Madeira, M'Dear -- Michael Flanders
(Poem #174)Madeira, M'Dear She was young, she was pure, she was new, she was nice She was fair, she was sweet seventeen He was old, he was vile, and no stranger to vice He was base, he was bad, he was mean He had slyly inveigled her up to his flat To view his collection of stamps And he said as he hastened to put out the cat The wine, his cigar and the lamps "Have some madeira, m'dear You really have nothing to fear I'm not trying to tempt you, that wouldn't be right You shouldn't drink spirits at this time of night Have some madeira, m'dear It's very much nicer than beer I don't care for sherry, one cannot drink stout And port is a wine I can well do without It's simply a case of 'chacun à son goût' Have some madeira, m'dear" Unaware of the wiles of the snake in the grass And the fate of the maiden who topes She lowered her standards by raising her glass Her courage, her eyes and his hopes She sipped it, she drank it, she drained it, she did He quietly refilled it again And he said as he secretly carved one more notch On the butt of his gold-handled cane "Have some madeira, m'dear, I've got a small cask of it here And once it's been opened, you know it won't keep Do finish it up, it will help you to sleep Have some madeira, m'dear, It's really an excellent year Now if it were gin, you'd be wrong to say yes The evil gin does would be hard to assess (Besides it's inclined to affect me prowess) Have some madeira, m'dear" Then there flashed through her mind what her mother had said With her antepenultimate breath "Oh my child, should you look on the wine that is red Be prepared for a fate worse than death!" She let go her glass with a shrill little cry Crash! tinkle! it fell to the floor When he asked, "What in Heaven?" she made no reply Up her mind, and a dash for the door "Have some madeira, m'dear", Rang out down the hall loud and clear A tremulous cry that was filled with despair As she fought to take breath in the cool midnight air "Have some madeira, m'dear" The words seemed to ring in her ear Until the next morning, she woke up in bed With a smile on her lips and an ache in her head And a beard in her ear 'ole that tickled and said "Have some madeira, m'dear" |
Critics Nightwatch -- Gwen Harwood
(Poem #173)Critics Nightwatch Once more he tried, before he slept, to rule his ranks of words. They broke from his planned choir, lolled, slouched and kept their tone, their pitch, their meaning crude; huddled in cliches; when pursued turned with mock elegance to croak his rival's tunes. They would not sing. The scene that nagged his sleep away flashed clear again: the local king of verse, loose-collared and loose-lipped. read from a sodden manuscript, drinking with anyone who'd pay, drunk, in the critic's favourite bar. "Hear the voice of the bard!" he bellowed, "Poets are lovers. Critics are mean, solitary masturbators. Come here, and join the warm creators." The critic, whom no drink had mellowed, turned on his heel. Rough laughter scoured his reddening neck. The poet roared "Run home, and take that face that soured your mother's lovely milk from spite. Piddle on what you cannot write." At home alone the critic poured gall on the poet's work in polished careful prose. He tore apart meaning and metaphor, demolished diction, syntax, metre, rhyme; called his entire works a crime against the integrity of art, and lay down grinning, quick, he thought, with a great poem that would make plain his power to all. Once more he fought with words. Sleep came. He dreamed he turned to a light vapour, seeped and burned in wordless cracks where grain on grain of matter grated; reassumed his human shape, and called by name each grain to sing, conducting, plumed in lightning, their obedient choir. Dressed as a bride for his desire towards him, now meek, the poet came. Light sneaked beside his bed. The birds began their insistent questioning of silence, and the poet's words prompted by daylight rasped his raw nerves, and the waking world he saw was flat with prose and would not sing. |
My Death -- Raymond Carver
(Poem #172)My Death If I'm lucky, I'll be wired every whichway in a hospital bed. Tubes running into my nose. But try not to be scared of me, friends! I'm telling you right now that this is okay. It's little enough to ask for at the end. Someone, I hope, will have phoned everyone to say, "Come quick, he's failing!" And they will come. And there will be time for me to bid goodbye to each of my loved ones. If I'm lucky, they'll step forward and I'll be able to see them one last time and take that memory with me. Sure, they might lay eyes on me and want to run away and howl. But instead, since they love me, they'll lift my hand and say "Courage" or "It's going to be all right." And they're right. It is all right. It's just fine. If you only knew how happy you've made me! I just hope my luck holds, and I can make some sign of recognition. Open and close my eyes as if to say, "Yes, I hear you. I understand you." I may even manage something like this: "I love you too. Be happy." I hope so! But I don't want to ask for too much. If I'm unlucky, as I deserve, well, I'll just drop over, like that, without any chance for farewell, or to press anyone's hand. Or say how much I cared for you and enjoyed your company all these years. In any case, try not to mourn for me too much. I want you to know I was happy when I was here. And remember I told you this a while ago - April 1984. But be glad for me if I can die in the presence of friends and family. If this happens, believe me, I came out ahead. I didn't lose this one. |
I Hear a River Thro' the Valley Wander -- Trumbull Stickney
(Poem #171)I Hear a River Thro' the Valley Wander I hear a river thro' the valley wander Whose water runs, the song alone remaining. A rainbow stands and summer passes under. |
Poetry -- Don Paterson
(Poem #170)Poetry In the same way that the mindless diamond keeps one spark of the planet's early fires trapped forever in its net of ice, it's not love's later heat that poetry holds, but the atom of the love that drew it forth from the silence: so if the bright coal of his love begins to smoulder, the poet hears his voice suddenly forced, like a bar-room singer's -- boastful with his own huge feeling, or drowned by violins; but if it yields a steadier light, he knows the pure verse, when it finally comes, will sound like a mountain spring, anonymous and serene. Beneath the blue oblivious sky, the water sings of nothing, not your name, not mine. |
If You Are Reading This -- Lynn Levin
(Poem #169)If You Are Reading This GIRL WITH DOG IN RAIN! Sweetheart, where are you now? Saw you at 16th and Walnut with your chocolate lab under an awning. It was raining parking lights and car horns. I was the guy double- parked delivering a tray of bagels to a corporate meeting. Nice stuff, 5 flavors, cream cheese and chives, butter daisies. Our eyes met, do you remember? I can't get you out of my mind. [Box 347] OLD LADY AT QUIK MART. When I weighed your peppers, you said I had my thumb on the scale, then you called over the manager who yelled at me and docked my pay. You: Old bag in a tan overcoat, muffler, purple pocketbook, evil eye. Me: Goatee, geek glasses, facial hardware. Please give me the opportunity to stab you. [Box 1601] CHAD, LET ME EXPLAIN. That guy you saw me with on R7 local on Columbus Day meant nothing to me. He's just a commuter. Your silent treatment is unbearable! I'm beggin' you baby, come back! [Box 776] PENN CENTER ELEVATORS FROM 16th TO 30th FLOOR. I want to push your magic buttons. I want to draw Mona Lisas on your beautiful skin. You: Backless red dress, black heels. Me: Bald guy, 35. We rode up together, you got off at 19. I was too shy to talk to you. Now full of regrets. How about sushi or tantric sex? [Box 1446] GUY ON R7 LOCAL OCT. 10, EVENING COMMUTE. You sat next to me and suddenly it was Valentine's Day. You liked my Offspring button. I told you about med tech school. You let me take your pulse. It was almost like holding hands. You: Hilfiger sweatshirt, laptop, got off at Somerton. Me: Hip chick, red hair, Capri jeans. Let's pick up where we left off. [Box 777] YO! YOU THERE ON DEERPATH DR. I'm the telemarketer you dissed. Wasn't selling you anything, SOB, just giving you a free estimate on kitchen cabinets. I know your number and where you live. Call now to apologize. [Box 961] OFFICEMAX, FEASTERVILLE, YEAR AND A HALF AGO. You: long black trenchcoat with three-piece suit. Me: Asian girl with black jacket, wet curly hair, tight black pants, sunglasses on my head. You stared at me a long time waiting at checkout. We looked at each other as you walked out. Will renew until I find you. [Box 1674] |
One Trick Pony -- Paul Simon
(Poem #168)One Trick Pony He's a one trick pony One trick is all that horse can do He does one trick only It's the principal source of his revenue And when he steps into the spotlight You can feel the heat of his heart Come rising through See how he dances See how he loops from side to side See how he prances The way his hooves just seem to glide He's just a one trick pony (that's all he is) But he turns that trick with pride He makes it look so easy He looks so clean He moves like God's Immaculate machine He makes me think about All of these extra movements I make And all of this herky-jerky motion And the bag of tricks it takes To get me through my working day One-trick pony He's a one trick pony He either fails or he succeeds He gives his testimony Then he relaxes in the weeds He's got one trick to last a lifetime But that's all a pony needs |
#46 -- Lawrence Ferlinghetti
(Poem #167)#46 And every poem and every picture a sensation in the eye and heart Something that jolts you awake from the rapt sleep of living in a flash of pure epiphany where all stands still in a diamond light transfixed revealed for what it truly is in all its mystery So a bird is an animal flown into a tree singing inscrutable melodies As a lover stands transparen Screened against the sun Smiling darkly in the blinding light |
I Wish In The City Of Your Heart -- Robley Wilson
(Poem #166)I Wish In The City Of Your Heart I wish in the city of your heart you would let me be the street where you walk when you are most yourself. I imagine the houses: It has been raining, but the rain is done and the children kept home have begun opening their doors. |
Love Over Gold -- Mark Knopfler
(Poem #165)Love Over Gold You walk out on the high wire you're a dancer on thin ice you pay no heed to the danger and less to advice your footsteps are forbidden but with a knowledge of your sin you throw your love to all the strangers and caution to the wind And you go dancing through doorways just to see what you will find leaving nothing to interfere with the crazy balance of your mind and when you finally reappear at the place where you came in you've thrown your love to all the strangers and caution to the wind It takes love over gold and mind over matter to do what you do that you must when the things that you hold can fall and be shattered or run through your fingers like dust |
Afraid So -- Jeanne Marie Beaumont
(Poem #164)Afraid So Is it starting to rain? Did the check bounce? Are we out of coffee? Is this going to hurt? Could you lose your job? Did the glass break? Was the baggage misrouted? Will this go on my record? Are you missing much money? Was anyone injured? Is the traffic heavy? Do I have to remove my clothes? Will it leave a scar? Must you go? Will this be in the papers? Is my time up already? Are we seeing the understudy? Will it affect my eyesight? Did all the books burn? Are you still smoking? Is the bone broken? Will I have to put him to sleep? Was the car totaled? Am I responsible for these charges? Are you contagious? Will we have to wait long? Is the runway icy? Was the gun loaded? Could this cause side effects? Do you know who betrayed you? Is the wound infected? Are we lost? Will it get any worse? |
Waiting -- Raymond Carver
(Poem #163)Waiting Left off the highway and down the hill. At the bottom, hang another left. Keep bearing left. The road will make a Y. Left again. There's a creek on the left. Keep going. Just before the road ends, there'll be another road. Take it and no other. Otherwise, your life will be ruined forever. There's a log house with a shake roof, on the left. It's not that house. It's the next house, just over a rise. The house where trees are laden with fruit. Where phlox, forsythia, and marigold grow. It's the house where the woman stands in the doorway wearing the sun in her hair. The one who's been waiting all this time. The woman who loves you. The one who can say, "What's kept you?" |
Letter to N.Y. -- Elizabeth Bishop
(Poem #162)Letter to N.Y. In your next letter I wish you'd say where you are going and what you are doing; how are the plays, and after the plays what other pleasures you're pursuing: taking cabs in the middle of the night, driving as if to save your soul where the road goes round and round the park and the meter glares like a moral owl, and the trees look so queer and green standing alone in big black caves and suddenly you're in a different place where everything seems to happen in waves, and most of the jokes you just can't catch, like dirty words rubbed off a slate, and the songs are loud but somehow dim and it gets so terribly late, and coming out of the brownstone house to the gray sidewalk, the watered street, one side of the buildings rises with the sun like a glistening field of wheat. —Wheat, not oats, dear. I'm afraid if it's wheat it's none of your sowing, nevertheless I'd like to know what you are doing and where you are going. |
I Knew a Woman -- Theodore Roethke
(Poem #161)I Knew a Woman I knew a woman, lovely in her bones, When small birds sighed, she would sigh back at them; Ah, when she moved, she moved more ways than one: The shapes a bright container can contain! Of her choice virtues only gods should speak, Or English poets who grew up on Greek (I'd have them sing in a chorus, cheek to cheek). How well her wishes went! She stroked my chin, She taught me Turn, and Counter-turn, and Stand; She taught me Touch, that undulant white skin; I nibbled meekly from her proffered hand; She was the sickle; I, poor I, the rake, Coming behind her for her pretty sake (But what prodigious mowing we did make). Love likes a gander, and adores a goose: Her full lips pursed, the errant notes to seize; She played it quick, she played it light and loose; My eyes, they dazzled at her flowing knees; Her several parts could keep a pure repose, Or one hip quiver with a mobile nose (She moved in circles, and those circles moved). Let seed be grass, and grass turn into hay: I'm martyr to a motion not my own; What's freedom for? To know eternity. I swear she cast a shadow white as stone. But who would count eternity in days? These old bones live to learn her wanton ways: (I measure time by how a body sways). |
Man Writes Poem -- Jay Leeming
(Poem #160)Man Writes Poem This just in: a man has begun writing a poem in a small room in Brooklyn. His curtains are apparently blowing in the breeze. We go now to our man Harry on the scene, what's the story down there Harry? "Well Chuck he has begun the second stanza and seems to be doing fine, he's using a blue pen, most poets these days use blue or black ink so blue is a fine choice. His curtains are indeed blowing in a breeze of some kind and what's more his radiator is 'whistling' somewhat. No metaphors have been written yet, but I'm sure he's rummaging around down there in the tin cans of his soul and will turn up something for us soon. Hang on—just breaking news here Chuck, there are 'birds singing' outside his window, and a car with a bad muffler has just gone by. Yes ... definitely a confirmation on the singing birds." Excuse me Harry but the poem seems to be taking on a very auditory quality at this point wouldn't you say? "Yes Chuck, you're right, but after years of experience I would hesitate to predict exactly where this poem is going to go. Why I remember being on the scene with Frost in '47, and with Stevens in '53, and if there's one thing about poems these days it's that hang on, something's happening here, he's just compared the curtains to his mother, and he's described the radiator as 'Roaring deep with the red walrus of History.' Now that's a key line, especially appearing here, somewhat late in the poem, when all of the similes are about to go home. In fact he seems a bit knocked out with the effort of writing that line, and who wouldn't be? Looks like ... yes, he's put down his pen and has gone to brush his teeth. Back to you Chuck." Well thanks Harry. Wow, the life of the artist. That's it for now, but we'll keep you informed of more details as they arise. |
Personals -- Robert Phillips
(Poem #159)Personals I'm honest, discreet, and no way a lech. Staying home with a rented video is just fine. I'm seeking a friend first, we'll see what happens next. My definition of fun is not very far-fetched: Enjoy fishing, four-wheeling, casinos, and wine. I'm honest, discreet, and no way a lech. Want face-to-face conversation, no phone sex, Non-smoking, drug-free women—the old-fashioned kind. I'm seeking a friend first, we'll see what happens next. I like a lady to let her hair down, get a little wrecked. I have brown hair, brown eyes, am built along trim lines. I'm honest, discreet, and no way a lech. I'm thirty-seven, white, have two teenagers by my ex. Looking for a lady, any age or race, similarly inclined. I'm seeking a friend first, we'll see what happens next. No psychos! (My ex didn't play with a full deck.) I live on the northwest side, near the refinery. I'm honest, discreet, and no way a lech. I'm seeking a friend first. We'll see what happens next. |
Compassion -- Miller Williams
(Poem #158)Compassion Have compassion for everyone you meet even if they don’t want it. What seems conceit, bad manners, or cynicism is always a sign of things no ears have heard, no eyes have seen. You do not know what wars are going on down there where the spirit meets the bone. |