“The Outcry” by William Bronk
What I want to do is shout. Happiness? No. Outrage? No. What I want to do is shout because we were all wrong, because the point was not the point, because the world, or what we took for the world, is...
View Article“If I should die tomorrow, please note that I will miss the particular” by...
music of the word “callipygian,” which means the having of well-shaped buttocks. I will miss the particular cruelty of tongue twisters in my first tongue: “Shíshì shīshì Shī Shì, shì shī, shì shí shí...
View Article“When I Am Asked” by Lisel Mueller (repost)
When I am asked how I began writing poems, I talk about the indifference of nature. It was soon after my mother died, a brilliant June day, everything blooming. I sat on a gray stone bench in a...
View Article“Mrs. God” by Connie Wanek
Someone had to do the dirty work, spading the garden, moving mountains, keeping the darkness out of the light, and she took every imperfection personally. Mr. Big Ideas, sure, but someone had to run...
View Article“Everyone must leave something behind when he dies… (Bradbury) (repost)
“Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand...
View Article“At Seventy-Five: Re-Reading An Old Book” by Hayden Carruth
My prayers have been answered, if they were prayers. I live. I’m alive, and even in rather good health, I believe. If I’d quit smoking I might live to be a hundred. Truly this is astonishing, after the...
View Article“Ordinary Days” by Stephen Dunn
The storm is over; too bad, I say. At least storms are clear about their dangerous intent. Ordinary days are what I fear, the sneaky speed with which noon arrives, the sun shining while a government...
View Article“Things Shouldn’t Be So Hard” by Kay Ryan
A life should leave deep tracks: ruts where she went out and back to get the mail or move the hose around the yard; where she used to stand before the sink, a worn-out place; beneath her hand the china...
View Article“Proverbs and Songs” by Antonio Machado
Dedicated to Jose Ortega y Gasset I The eye you see is not an eye because you see it; it is an eye because it sees you. II To talk with someone, ask a question first, then — listen. III Narcissism is...
View Article“Lead” by Mary Oliver
Here is a story to break your heart. Are you willing? This winter the loons came to our harbor and died, one by one, of nothing we could see. A friend told me of one on the shore that lifted its head...
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