Separation by W. S. Merwin
Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle.
Everything I do is stitched with its color.
(In celebration of National Poetry Month, I am sharing a poem each day this month.)
Pieces of Blue
What I'm playing with today: scraps of a linen jacket, Doug's striped shirt, a piece left from making a linen dress for Adeline, a pair of linen pants, some lovely vintage polka dots ... crosses, circles, blue, squares ... linen, stripes, patterns ... groups of three, groups of nine ... some of these elements we find since the beginning of time.
I don't know where I'm headed with this, but I assume I'll get there. Sooner or later.
A Prior Despair
A Prior Despair by Scott Cairns
After Kavafy
When I saw that I had lost her completely, I sought the dulcet
taste of her on the lips of each subsequent woman, her fragrant
flesh in the fold of every lover's nape thereafter, and her heat
welling with my own and drawing out an urgency in each
ambiguous woman met in that tortured interim.
When I saw that I had lost her I was lost, and held
my eyes shut tight that I might so delude my wits as to trust
that it was she receiving me, that it was she returning
with delight the urgent drive against the unbearable
distance--two bodies, struggling toward agreeable repose.
Then, tasting once a sudden kiss so suddenly presented,
I saw another prospect rise to view, and knew reprieve
from the familiar ring of hell, from which I rose and marveled
at the offer of another life whose heat and heady fragrance
rose, delirious to burn deliciously, and not consume.
(In celebration of National Poetry Month, I am sharing a poem each day this month.)
Whisper
Love Poem of Flowers by Victoria Maretti
Whisper
Drop peonies in my eardrums
Sew violets under my skin
Take all my fragrance in and
Exhale
Pave a path of fuchsia petals
We’ll share baths with chrysanthemums, lilies, hydrangeas
And crown ourselves in wreaths of all the roses.
(In celebration of National Poetry Month, I am sharing a poem each day this month.)
PHOTO :: DOUG CRITES-MOORE
Uninitiated Me
When Your Face Came Rising by Yevgeny Yevtushenko
When your face came rising
above my crumpled life,
the only thing I understood at first
was how meager were all my possessions.
But your face cast a peculiar glow
on forests, seas, and rivers,
initiating into the colors of the world
uninitiated me.
I'm so afraid, I'm so afraid,
the unexpected dawn might end
ending the discoveries, tears, and raptures,
but I refuse to fight this fear.
This fear-I understand-
is love itself. I cherish this fear,
not knowing how to cherish,
I, careless guardian of my love.
This fear has ringed me tightly.
These moments are so brief, I know,
and for me the colors will disappear
when once your face has set.
When Doug and I were first dating, he made a point of showing me this poem. I assumed it was my face which cast a glow upon his crumpled life and, naturally, I fell in love with him. Now we've been married 33-plus years and I'm suddenly realizing it wasn't about me, except that he loved it and he wanted to share it with me and I guess that's just as good as having a glowing face.
(In celebration of National Poetry Month, I am sharing a poem each day this month.)
Liberty and Justice
Children's Rhymes by Langston Hughes
By what sends
the white kids
I ain't sent:
I know I can't
be President.
What don't bug
them white kids
sure bugs me:
We know everybody
ain't free.
Lies written down
for white folks
ain't for us a-tall:
Liberty And Justice--
Huh!--For All?
(In celebration of National Poetry Month, I am sharing a poem each day this month.)