Monthly Archives: April 2022
Burning the Old Year ~ Nye
Burning the Old Year Letters swallow themselves in seconds. Notes friends tied to the doorknob, transparent scarlet paper, sizzle like moth wings, marry the air. So much of any year is flammable, lists of vegetables, partial poems. Orange swirling flame … Continue reading
** will be back to correct this ** Numbers I like the generosity of numbers. The way, for example,they are willing to countanything or anyone:two pickles, one door to the room,eight dancers dressed as swans. I like the domesticity of … Continue reading
Poem ~ Hikmet
Poem I’m inside the advancing light, my hands are hungry, the world beautiful. My eyes can’t get enough of the trees — they’re so hopeful, so green. A sunny road runs through the mulberries, I’m at the window of … Continue reading
The Poet Compares Human Nature to the Ocean From Which We Came ~ Oliver
The Poet Compares Human Nature to the Ocean From Which We Came The sea can do craziness, it can do smooth, it can lie down like silk breathing or toss havoc shoreward, it can give gifts or withhold all; … Continue reading
Summer Rain ~ Lowell
Summer Rain All night our room was outer-walled with rain. Drops fell and flattened on the tin roof, And rang like little disks of metal. Ping! — Ping! — and there was not a pin-point of silence between them. … Continue reading
Holding the Light ~ Kestenbaum
Holding the Light for Kait Rhoads Gather up whatever is glittering in the gutter, whatever has tumbled in the waves or fallen in flames out of the sky, for it’s not only our hearts that are broken, but the heart … Continue reading
When Will I Be Home ~ Li Shang-Yin
When Will I Be Home? When will I be home? I don’t know. In the mountains, in the rainy night, The Autumn lake is flooded. Someday we will be back together again. We will sit in the candlelight by … Continue reading
For Keeps ~ Harjo
For Keeps Sun makes the day new. Tiny green plants emerge from earth. Birds are singing the sky into place. There is nowhere else I want to be but here. I lean into the rhythm of your heart to … Continue reading
Reading the Obituary Page ~ Pastan
Reading the Obituary Page In starched dresses with ribbons in miniature jackets and tiny ties we would circle the chairs at birthday parties and when the music stopped, lunge to be seated. One by one we were welcomed to hard ground … Continue reading
Tax Day Limericks
There once was a young man from Lyme Who married three wives at a time When asked, “Why a third?” He replied, “One’s absurd, And bigamy, sir, is a crime!” There once was a fellow named Brian Who was bitten … Continue reading