It’s Hard to Keep a Clean Shirt Clean, by June Jordan (1936-2002) It’s a sunlit morning with jasmine blooming easily and a drove of robin redbreasts diving into the ivy covering what used to be a backyard fence or doves shoving aside the birch tree leaves when a young man walks among the flowers to […]
First Dawn Light, by Robert Penn Warren (1905-1989) By lines fainter gray than the faintest geometry Of chalk, on a wall like a blackboard, day’s first light Defines the window edges. Last dream, last owl-cry Now past, now is the true emptiness of night, For not yet first bird-stir, first bird-note, only Your breath […]
Buddhist New Year Song, by Diane di Prima (1934-) I saw you in green velvet, wide full sleeves seated in front of a fireplace, our house made somehow more gracious, and you said “There are stars in your hair”— it was truth I brought down with me to this sullen and dingy place that […]
Last Snow, by Heid E. Erdrich (1963-) Dumped wet and momentary on a dull ground that’s been clear but clearly sleeping, for days. Last snow melts as it falls, piles up slush, runs in first light making a music in the streets we wish we could keep. Last snow. That’s what we’ll think for weeks […]
Silences, by E. J. Pratt (1882-1964) There is no silence upon the earth or under the earth like the silence under the sea; No cries announcing birth, No sounds declaring death. There is silence when the milt is laid on the spawn in the weeds and fungus of the rock—clefts; And silence in the growth […]
No Images, by William Waring Cuney (1906-1976) She does not know her beauty, she thinks her brown body has no glory. If she could dance naked under palm trees and see her image in the river, she would know. But there are no palm trees on the street, and dish water gives back […]
What’s Broken, by Dorianne Laux (1952-) The slate black sky. The middle step of the back porch. And long ago my mother’s necklace, the beads rolling north and south. Broken the rose stem, water into drops, glass knobs on the bedroom door. Last summer’s pot of parsley and mint, white roots shooting […]
The New Colossus, by Emma Lazarus (1849-1887) Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame, With conquering limbs astride from land to land; Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand Glows world-wide welcome; […]
The Role of Elegy, by Mary Jo Bang (1946-) The role of elegy is To put a death mask on tragedy, A drape on the mirror. To bow to the cultural Debate over the aesthetization of sorrow, Of loss, of the unbearable Afterimage of the once material. To look for an imagined Consolidation […]
The Homecoming, by Anna Wickham (1884-1947) I waited ten years in the husk That once had been our home, Watching from dawn to dusk To see if he would come. And there he was beside me Always at board and bed; I looked — and woe betide me He I had loved was dead. […]