The Poetry Playground

The Obligation to Be Happy

It is more onerous
than the rites of beauty
or housework, harder than love.
But you expect if of me casually,
the way you expect the sun
to come up, not in spite of rain
or clouds but because of them.

And so I smile, as if my own fidelity
to sadness were a hidden vice –
that downward tug on my mouth,
my old suspicion that health
and love are brief irrelevancies,
no more than laughter in the warm dark
strangled at dawn.

Happiness. I try to hoist it
on my narrow shoulders again –
a knapsack heavy with gold coins.
I stumble around the house,
bump into things.
Only Midas himself
would understand.

~ Linda Pastan

Getting Older
The first surprise: I like it.
Whatever happens now, some things
that used to terrify have not:

I didn’t die young, for instance. Or lose
my only love. My three children
never had to run away from anyone.

Don’t tell me this gratitude is complacent.
We all approach the edge of the same blackness
which for me is silent.

Knowing as much sharpens
my delight in January freesia,
hot coffee, winter sunlight. So we say

as we lie close on some gentle occasion:
every day won from such
darkness is a celebration.

~ Elaine Feinstein

On Days Like This
On days like this . . .
Before the dawn ever happens
when the sky is still dark
and the morning star bright. It is
on days like this . . .
When the last of the night spills
into the ravine.
When my mind is filled with the
thoughts of smooth stones.
It is on days like this . . .
When the garden is damp
And the wind
still trapped
inside my ear.
And I find the same pebble twice
when my pocket it full
it is on days like this . . .
It is on days exactly like this . . .

~ Das Lanzillotti

Everyone Sang

Everyone suddenly burst out singing;
And I was filled with such delight
As prisoned birds must find in freedom,
Winging wildly across the white
Orchards and dark-green fields; on – on – and out of sight.

Everyone’s voice was suddenly lifted;
And beauty came like the setting sun:
My heart was shaken with tears; and horror
Drifted away . . . O, but Everyone
Was a bird; and the song was wordless; the singing will never be done.

~ Siegfried Sasson

Looking at the Sea
I have today and tomorrow,
I hear amplified voices,
The sun shines, the arbor
Shades, and people talk.

Actors write, writers act,
It can be the same or not,
And criticism can be praise,
But love can only be love.

Mysticism is obfuscation,
She explains to anyone,
The sea is salty, you taste
Your mouth and hurt feet.

Now it is the sunset they
Have come to see. Islands
Lying on the horizon.
We have today and tomorrow.

~ Vincent Katz

Before

No shoes and a glossy
red helmet, I rode
on the back of my dad’s
Harley at seven years old.
Before the divorce.
Before the new apartment.
Before the new marriage.
Before the apple tree.
Before the ceramics in the garbage.
Before the dog’s chain.
Before the koi were all eaten
by the crane. Before the road
between us, there was the road
beneath us, and I was just
big enough not to let go:
Henno Road, creek just below,
rough wind, chicken legs,
and I never knew survival
was like that. If you live,
you look back and beg
for it again, the hazardous
bliss before you know
what you would miss.

~ Ada Limon

Summons

Keep me from going to sleep too soon
Or if I go to sleep too soon
Come wake me up. Come any hour
Of night. Come whistling up the road.
Stomp on the porch. Bang on the door.
Make me get out of bed and come
And let you in and light a light.
Tell me the northern lights are on
And make me look. Or tell me clouds
Are doing something to the moon
They never did before, and show me.
See that I see. Talk to me till
I’m half as wide awake as you
And start to dress wondering why
I ever went to bed at all.
Tell me the walking is superb.
Not only tell me but persuade me.
You know I’m not too hard persuaded.

~ Robert Francis