4 beauties shared by billy collins on FB LIve on April 13, 2021

 

Postscript

Seamus Heaney

And some time make the time to drive out west

Into County Clare, along the Flaggy Shore,

In September or October, when the wind

And the light are working off each other

So that the ocean on one side is wild

With foam and glitter, and inland among stones

The surface of a slate-grey lake is lit

By the earthed lightning of a flock of swans,

Their feathers roughed and ruffling, white on white,

Their fully grown headstrong-looking heads

Tucked or cresting or busy underwater.

Useless to think you’ll park and capture it

More thoroughly. You are neither here nor there,

A hurry through which known and strange things pass

As big soft buffetings come at the car sideways

And catch the heart off guard and blow it open.

Monet refuses the Operation

Lissel Meuller

Doctor, you say there are no haloes

around the streetlights in Paris

and what I see is an aberration

caused by old age, an affliction.

I tell you it has taken me all my life

to arrive at the vision of gas lamps as angels,

to soften and blur and finally banish

the edges you regret I don’t see,

to learn that the line I called the horizon

does not exist and sky and water,

so long apart, are the same state of being.

Fifty-four years before I could see

Rouen cathedral is built

of parallel shafts of sun,

and now you want to restore

my youthful errors: fixed

notions of top and bottom,

the illusion of three-dimensional space,

wisteria separate

from the bridge it covers.

What can I say to convince you

the Houses of Parliament dissolve

night after night to become

the fluid dream of the Thames?

I will not return to a universe

of objects that don’t know each other,

as if islands were not the lost children

of one great continent. The world

is flux, and light becomes what it touches,

becomes water, lilies on water,

above and below water,

becomes lilac and mauve and yellow

and white and cerulean lamps,

small fists passing sunlight

so quickly to one another

that it would take long, streaming hair

inside my brush to catch it.

To paint the speed of light!

Our weighted shapes, these verticals,

burn to mix with air

and change our bones, skin, clothes

to gases. Doctor,

if only you could see

how heaven pulls earth into its arms

and how infinitely the heart expands

to claim this world, blue vapor without end.

verities :: kim addonizio

Into every life a little ax must fall.

Every dog has its choke chain.

Every cloud has a shadow.

Better dead than fed.

He who laughs, will not last.

Sticks and stones will break you,

and then the names of things will be changed.

A stitch in time saves no one.

The darkest hour comes.

 Poem by Javan

Today I passed you on the street

You gave a smile as our eyes did meet

In the rush of the day

There was only time

To take a picture within my mind

But later sometime at my apartment again

When the dark of the night and the lonelies set in

I’ll flip the pages of my mind

And the picture of you I will find

Then through the night I will hold to you

A stranger that I never knew

And I can only hope

That it might be

Someone

Somewhere

Is holding me

Gifts
Yakov Azriel

"O give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, for his unconditional love endures forever."


(Psalm 136:1)


Your love, Your unconditional love, Lord,
Reflected in the shining of Your face
And in its light; Your freely given grace
Which overflows the cup that You have poured
For us to drink; the undeserved reward
Which You bestow on us; Your warm embrace
Uplifting us from every lowly place
In which we hid, from caverns we explored —

All these You've given us, O Lord. No word
In human speech is able to express
The vastness of Your mercy's sea, or how
You navigate our ships. Still, the Faith-bird
Possesses songs revealing ways to bless
Your name aboard our boats, both aft and bow.

Yakov Azriel is an English language poet who lives in Israel

Advice from a Tree

 

By Ilan Shamir

Dear Friend,
Stand Tall and Proud
Sink your roots deeply into the Earth
Reflect the light of a greater source
Think long term
Go out on a limb
Remember your place among all living beings
Embrace with joy the changing seasons
For each yields its own abundance
The Energy and Birth of Spring
The Growth and Contentment of Summer
The Wisdom to let go of leaves in the Fall
The Rest and Quiet Renewal of Winter
Feel the wind and the sun
And delight in their presence
Look up at the moon that shines down upon you
And the mystery of the stars at night.
Seek nourishment from the good things in life
Simple pleasures
Earth, fresh air, light
Be content with your natural beauty
Drink plenty of water
Let your limbs sway and dance in the breezes
Be flexible
Remember your roots
Enjoy the view!

The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver
BY EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY

“Son,” said my mother,

When I was knee-high,


“You’ve need of clothes to cover you,

And not a rag have I.



“There’s nothing in the house

To make a boy breeches,

Nor shears to cut a cloth with

Nor thread to take stitches.



“There’s nothing in the house

But a loaf-end of rye,

And a harp with a woman’s head

Nobody will buy,”


And she began to cry.



That was in the early fall.

When came the late fall,


“Son,” she said, “the sight of you


Makes your mother’s blood crawl,—



“Little skinny shoulder-blades

Sticking through your clothes!

And where you’ll get a jacket from

God above knows.



“It’s lucky for me, lad,

Your daddy’s in the ground,

And can’t see the way I let

His son go around!”

And she made a queer sound.



That was in the late fall.

When the winter came,

I’d not a pair of breeches

Nor a shirt to my name.



I couldn’t go to school,

Or out of doors to play.

And all the other little boys

Passed our way.



“Son,” said my mother,

“Come, climb into my lap,

And I’ll chafe your little bones

While you take a nap.”



And, oh, but we were silly

For half an hour or more,

Me with my long legs

Dragging on the floor,



A-rock-rock-rocking

To a mother-goose rhyme!

Oh, but we were happy

For half an hour’s time!



But there was I, a great boy,

And what would folks say

To hear my mother singing me

To sleep all day,

In such a daft way?



Men say the winter

Was bad that year;

Fuel was scarce,

And food was dear.



A wind with a wolf’s head

Howled about our door,

And we burned up the chairs

And sat on the floor.



All that was left us

Was a chair we couldn’t break,

And the harp with a woman’s head

Nobody would take,

For song or pity’s sake.



The night before Christmas

I cried with the cold,

I cried myself to sleep

Like a two-year-old.



And in the deep night

I felt my mother rise,

And stare down upon me

With love in her eyes.



I saw my mother sitting

On the one good chair,

A light falling on her

From I couldn’t tell where,



Looking nineteen,

And not a day older,

And the harp with a woman’s head

Leaned against her shoulder.



Her thin fingers, moving

In the thin, tall strings,

Were weav-weav-weaving

Wonderful things.



Many bright threads,

From where I couldn’t see,

Were running through the harp-strings

Rapidly,



And gold threads whistling

Through my mother’s hand.

I saw the web grow,

And the pattern expand.



She wove a child’s jacket,

And when it was done

She laid it on the floor

And wove another one.



She wove a red cloak

So regal to see,


“She’s made it for a king’s son,”

I said, “and not for me.”

But I knew it was for me.



She wove a pair of breeches

Quicker than that!

She wove a pair of boots

And a little cocked hat.



She wove a pair of mittens,

She wove a little blouse,

She wove all night

In the still, cold house.



She sang as she worked,

And the harp-strings spoke;

Her voice never faltered,

And the thread never broke.

And when I awoke,—



There sat my mother

With the harp against her shoulder

Looking nineteen

And not a day older,



A smile about her lips,

And a light about her head,

And her hands in the harp-strings

Frozen dead.



And piled up beside her

And toppling to the skies,

Were the clothes of a king’s son,

Just my size.



Source: The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver (Flying Cloud Press, 1922)

What You Missed That Day You Were Absent from Fourth Grade

 by Brad Aaron Modlin

Mrs. Nelson explained how to stand still and listen
to the wind, how to find meaning in pumping gas,

how peeling potatoes can be a form of prayer. She took
questions on how not to feel lost in the dark

After lunch she distributed worksheets
that covered ways to remember your grandfather’s

voice. Then the class discussed falling asleep
without feeling you had forgotten to do something else—

something important—and how to believe
the house you wake in is your home. This prompted

Mrs. Nelson to draw a chalkboard diagram detailing
how to chant the Psalms during cigarette breaks,

and how not to squirm for sound when your own thoughts
are all you hear; also, that you have enough.

The English lesson was that I am
is a complete sentence.

And just before the afternoon bell, she made the math equation
look easy. The one that proves that hundreds of questions,

and feeling cold, and all those nights spent looking
for whatever it was you lost, and one person

add up to something.

By Mourid Barghouti

Silence said:
truth needs no eloquence.
After the death of the horseman,
the homeward-bound horse
says everything
without saying anything.