FUN Poems.
Prosody
I've never studied prosody
and I'm not sure I should.
My mind would prob'ly paralyze;
my brain would seem like wood.
It doesn't matter, anyway;
it's just a bunch of rules --
I prob'ly wouldn't follow, 'cuz
I'm not so good with tools.
I think it's all about the way
you count stuff and keep score,
but I get lost, can't concentrate,
confused by "less" and "more".
Structure, form, the shape it takes
seem just short of the point
the poet might be trying to make
as readers "case the joint."
In bowing out of studying
I mean no disrespect.
I'm just not sure, technically,
of how we can connect
with reader after reader, who
really may not "know"
intricacies and subtleties
the academics blow
out of proportion, trying hard
to show that they are bright,
but somehow come up very short
and can't agree what's "right."
So I'll just go on writing "stuff"
I think and "stuff" I feel.
My chariot will trundle on
with its square, wooden wheels.
With Richard Shelton I will join
in watching what occurs
within me and around me,
to minimize our fears
that persons who don't think a lot
about what really counts
will still believe the same mistake, --
that counting will win out!
(LEB 9/16/04)
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Richard Shelton is a favorite poet
of mine, and the next one is one
of his best.
DEAR LIFE
If I use my imagination
I can create a river
Where I can fish
Swim or drown myself
There are always choices
After I have had a bad meal
I do not demand my hunger back
Nor do I expect the night
To be less cold
Because I lack a coat
Pain is a room I measure
Each time I am in it
And each time I leave
I forget the dimensions
The wind blows over the desert
Telling me nothing
But when I forget the force
To which broken stones complain
I will be lost
When I cannot feel the vine's
Need to hold on to something
Or when I am happy
Only in the presence of others
I will be lost
To the God of Joy
Or the God of Sadness
I could tell everything
And each would accept my story
And claim me for his own
But to the God of Remorse
I have nothing to say
And no time to say it
I am holding on for dear life
As my chariot rolls
Into the future
Faster than I would have thought
Possible on its square
Wooden wheels.
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THE JOURNEY
by Mary Oliver
one day you finally know
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice --
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles,
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very
foundations --
though their melancholy was terrible.
I was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice, which you slowly
recognized as your own, that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do --
determined to save
the only life you could save.
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Poems by Naomi Shihab Nye
from WORDS UNDER THE WORDS
The Art of Disappearing
When they say Don't I know you?
say no.
When they invite you to the party
remember what parties are like
before answering.
Someone telling you in a loud voice
they once wrote a poem.
Greasy sausage balls on a paper plate.
Then reply.
If they say We should get together
say why?
It's not that you don't love them anymore.
You're trying to remember something
too important to forget/
Trees. The monastery bell at twilight.
Tell them you have a new project.
It will never be finished.
When someone recognizes you in a grocery store
nod briefly and become a cabbage.
When someone you haven't seen in ten years
appears at the door,
don't start singing him all your new songs.
You will never catch up.
Walk around feeling like a leaf.
Know you could tumble any second.
Then decide what to do with your time.
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ADIOS
It is a good word, rolling off the tongue
no matter what the language you were born with.
Use it. Learn where it begins,
the small alphabet of departure,
how long it takes to think of it,
then say it, then be heard.
Marry it. More than any golden ring,
it shines, it shines.
Wear it on every finger
till your hands dance,
touching everything easily,
letting everything, easily, go.
Strap it to oyur back like wings.
Or a kite-tail. The stream of air behind a jet.
If you are known for anything,
let it be the way you rise out of sight
when your work is finished.
Think of things that linger: leaves,
cartons and napkins, the damp smell of mold.
Think of things that disappear.
Think of what you love best,
what brings tears into your eyes.
Something that said adios to you
before you knew what it meant
or how long it was for.
Explain little, the word explains itself.
Later perhaps. Lessons following lessons,
like silence following sound.
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FAMOUS
The river is famous to the fish.
The loud voice is famous to silence,
which knew it would inherit the earth
before anyone said so.
The cat sleeping on the fence is famous to the birds
watching him from the birdhouse.
The tear is famous, briefly, to the cheek.
The idea you carry close to your bosom
is famous to your bosom.
The boot is famous to the earth,
more famous than the dress shoe,
which is famous only to floors.
The bent photograph is famous to the one who carries it
and not at all famous to the one who is pictured.
I want to be famous to shuffling men
who smile while crossing streets,
sticky children in grocery lines,
famous as one who smiled back.
I want to be famous in the way a pulley is famous,
or a buttonhole, not because it did anything spectacular,
but because it never forgot what it could do.
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