poetry - Encouragement

poetry

Tomas Tranströmer, "Kyrie"

What is it like when everyone yearns for a taste of the miraculous, abandoning anyone not part of the throng?

poetry

Sappho, "And I said" (tr. Mary Barnard)

I imagine Sappho's sacrifice of a goat messy in more than one way, as she wants a god to cure her inner turmoil.

poetry

Sappho, "I asked myself" (tr. Mary Barnard)

Our age shuns unfocused activities: we tell 14 year olds they must promptly choose a career and stick to it.

poetry

Sappho, "Standing by my bed" (tr. Mary Barnard)

I am certain if Emily Dickinson were alive today, she would be an extremely horny Tumblr power user.

poetry

Sappho, "Tell everyone" (tr. Mary Barnard)

"I shall / sing beautifully for / my friends' pleasure."

poetry

Kay Ryan, "All Your Horses"

We are brought into the thick of a crisis, one with nearly imperceptible beginnings but severe consequences.

poetry

Sara Miller, "Countermeasures"

Thus you have to turn to the ducks. There is no choice.

poetry

Virginia Konchan, "Zoo"

I'm sitting with "the clay heart of Nature," thinking how malleable the most pristine encounters I've had with the natural world have been.

poetry

Ye Hui, "The Witch"

The witch proclaiming "You see nothing / Clearly" is the one statement of this poem which fits the facts.

poetry

Kay Ryan, "New Rooms"

How do each of us deal with a world continually in flux without any time to think?

poetry

Robin Davidson, "Winter Litany"

I confess I was never patient enough to sit and watch the snow fall for a little while.

basho

Bashō, "Here, where a thousand captains swore"

The only legacy which matters is a space for others.

poetry

Yosa Buson, "The old fisherman"

I wonder if this is aging: refusing to look elsewhere, focusing on the object in front.

poetry

Seamus Heaney, "North"

We travel to see history and find dust.

poetry

Kay Ryan, "Why We Must Struggle"

At some point, the world is in fact a moral order, because it cannot be otherwise.

poetry

Charles Simic, "In the Street"

Simic's "In the Street" voices a compelling, somewhat hopeless romanticism.

poetry

Wisława Szymborska, "Vermeer"

I've encountered plenty of monsters who have immersed themselves in what they think is a moral vision.

poetry

Emily Dickinson, "I never saw a Moor" (1052)

You don't have to be a pagan to know that some areas are meant to be wild and untouched.

poetry

Andrea Cohen, "Seaside"

It's funny how planning can be the achievement itself.

poetry

Kay Ryan, "We’re Building the Ship as We Sail It"

...you shouldn’t reason the same way in emergencies as you do when things are normal.

poetry

Kay Ryan, "Crocodile Tears"

The tropes are in charge, far more than actual people.

poetry

Marcin Świetlicki, "Photograph"

It is not a loss to recognize how you remember and how you love.

poetry

Robert Creeley, "Small Time"

Robert Creeley's "Small Time" is a conversational poem.

poetry

Emily Dickinson, "Spring is the Period" (844)

You will have your days on Earth and they will be numbered.

poetry

Marcin Świetlicki, "April 1, Wągrowiec, Poland"

Świetlicki grabs you, spins you around, and throws you into a dark, remote place.