here, it rains
for days at at time,
the drops, they
form a blanket
i pull it close, over my nose,
earth wet trees wet scent, deeply primal
we all
(green and skin)
absorb the sky.
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absorb the sky
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life on the vines
i live life on the vines,
in the stillness of earth tilled in rows.when it rains, i feel it in my toes
as if they too are rooted
summer sunlight fills my soul
as it plumps the grapes
and in harvest, i taste the sweetness
of another year passing.
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The Vacation by Wendell Berry
Great piece featured by Ted Kooser today~ and great advise for me as I get ready for my next big adventure. Taking the family to Italy/Sicily! WOO! So if you don’t hear from me until June, you’ll know why 🙂BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE
If we haven’t done it ourselves, we’ve known people who have, it seems: taken a vacation mostly to photograph a vacation, not really looking at what’s there, but seeing everything through the viewfinder with the idea of looking at it when they get home. Wendell Berry of Kentucky, one of our most distinguished poets, captures this perfectly.
The Vacation
Once there was a man who filmed his vacation.He went flying down the river in his boatwith his video camera to his eye, makinga moving picture of the moving riverupon which his sleek boat moved swiftlytoward the end of his vacation. He showedhis vacation to his camera, which pictured it,preserving it forever: the river, the trees,the sky, the light, the bow of his rushing boatbehind which he stood with his camerapreserving his vacation even as he was having itso that after he had had it he would stillhave it. It would be there. With a flickof a switch, there it would be. But hewould not be in it. He would never be in it.American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2012 by Wendell Berry, whose most recent book of poems is New Collected Poems, Counterpoint, 2012. Poem reprinted from New Collected Poems, Counterpoint, 2012, and used with permission of Wendell Berry and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2013 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.
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coal and chalk
we, entangled, are a chimney on a roof in a city charmed by night.
below us
lives a stretch of danger like crumbled cement,
corner-cut deals.darkness has its way
of invitingus to pull taller in the shadows. mark these choices
with coal and chalk.legs on legs, before the lightning …
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the voices
downstairs. the voices. i lay awake to the voices. they crescendo in no particular time, die down slightly (i may close my eyes) erupt again. in a cadance they can’t control. in a swirling tsunami of sound. they swell around me. they form a cocoon so that i may lose my skin. so i may wall myself in, shed my regrets, live vicariously through strange voices choosing a late hour. choosing to pet each others questionable decisions. i am becoming them. i am rocking ever so slightly to the hum. shadows on the walls dance wickedly, my naked little fears run away. i shed them overnight in this chysalis. in this safe haven humdrum silent bed fed by voices. pick up a storyline from a deep baritone, drift off as a narrator in a lengthy surrealist novel, one where sweet home is nothing but a painted highway running past an apartment filled with voices.
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"Understanding Graphite" by Oonah V. Joslin
My dear friend and managing editor of EveryDayPoets.com Oonah Joslin won a recent postcard poem contest! Congrats Oonah! Read her work and check out EDP for some great everyday inspiration!
Read it here: Understanding Graphite
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Arnold (reaching full sail)
I wonder how Arnold feels
on the Canton docks, drying his skin
after a windy cold winter.He will be under a new moon tonight
streets lit up with
city haze alone.
He will be under the awning of Safeway
sketchbook clutched in one hand,
bottle in the other.“Maybe,” he says, “if I hadn’t been drunk that day
I would have met Oprah before
she moved to Chicago and I could call her now
as a friend.”The harbor sways up to comment
but only trash reaches the dock. Far beyond,
other peoples’ boats reach full sail
into the Bay.
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#Poetry Friday
#Poetry round-up today! WOO! Some oldies I pulled randomly out of the hat. Remember – over 650 posts here. Make sure, on rainy days like today, you spend some time and look around 🙂
Finding Robert Zimmerman
the ex-stripper
Artist (My Mother on the Shore)
Sky cannot know Ground
All roads less traveled…
the yarn spinner
sunset while house-sitting
untitled (first spring nights)
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to the pagoda at sunset
pavement pounding, slight sweat on a brow still pale from winter
to the top
of an ancient hill –
a pagodaacross its steps, you all lounge like
trees in heavy blossom
pink and white sky, our silky fragrant breaths
mingle with the orange glowsinking
into a city skyline full of shadows
rowhomes full of secrets
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"Burning the Book" by Ron Koertge
Hi friends, been in a creative slump recently but hoping to get back to writing soon. Busy busy but as the weather turns, hopefully, so will the ideas. Until then~ enjoy Ron Koertge’s piece below. Wonderfully expressive imagery.
American Life in Poetry: Column 419BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE
It pains an old booklover like me to think of somebody burning a book, but if you’ve gotten one for a quarter and it’s falling apart, well, maybe it’s OK as long as you might be planning to pick up a better copy. Here Ron Koertge, who lives in Pasadena, has some fun with the ashes of love poems.
Burning the Book
The anthology of love poems I bought
for a quarter is brittle, anyway, and comes
apart when I read it.One at a time, I throw pages on the fire
and watch smoke make its way up
and out.I’m almost to the index when I hear
a murmuring in the street. My neighbors
are watching it snow.I put on my blue jacket and join them.
The children stand with their mouths
open.I can see nouns—longing, rapture, bliss—
land on every tongue, then disappear.
American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2012 by Ron Koertge, whose most recent book of poems is Fever, Red Hen Press, 2006. Poem reprinted by permission of Ron Koertge. Introduction copyright © 2013 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.
Poetry by JC Snyder 