may my heart always be open to little – ee cummings

may my heart always be open to little
birds who are the secrets of living
whatever they sing is better than to know
and if men should not hear them men are old

may my mind stroll about hungry
and fearless and thirsty and supple
and even if it’s sunday may i be wrong
for whenever men are right they are not young

and may myself do nothing usefully
and love yourself so more than truly
there’s never been quite such a fool who could fail
pulling all the sky over him with one smile

 

Retrieved from: Poem Hunter

when faces called flowers float – ee cummings

when faces called flowers float out of the ground
and breathing is wishing and wishing is having-
but keeping is downward and doubting and never
-it’s april(yes,april;my darling)it’s spring!
yes the pretty birds frolic as spry as can fly
yes the little fish gambol as glad as can be
(yes the mountains are dancing together)

when every leaf opens without any sound
and wishing is having and having is giving-
but keeping is doting and nothing and nonsense
-alive;we’re alive,dear:it’s(kiss me now)spring!
now the pretty birds hover so she and so he
now the little fish quiver so you and so i
(now the mountains are dancing, the mountains)

when more than was lost has been found has been found
and having is giving and giving is living-
but keeping is darkness and winter and cringing
-it’s spring(all our night becomes day)o,it’s spring!
all the pretty birds dive to the heart of the sky
all the little fish climb through the mind of the sea
(all the mountains are dancing;are dancing)

Retrieved from: Poem Hunter

wrist-wrestling father – Orval Lund

On the maple wood we placed our elbows

and gripped hands, the object to bend

the other’s arm to the kitchen table.

We flexed our arms and waited for the sign.

I once shot a wild goose.

I once stood not twenty feet from a buck deer unnoticed.

I’ve seen a woods full of pink lady slippers.

I once caught a 19-inch trout on a tiny fly.

I’ve seen the Pacific, I’ve seen the Atlantic,

I’ve watched whales in each.

I once heard Lenny Bruce tell jokes.

I’ve seen Sandy Koufax pitch a baseball.

I’ve heard Paul Desmond play the saxophone.

I’ve been to London to see the Queen.

I’ve had dinner with a Nobel Prize poet.

I wrote a poem once with every word but one just right.

I’ve fathered two fine sons

and loved the same woman for twenty-five years.

But I’ve never been more amazed

than when I snapped my father’s arm down to the table.

The Leaf and the Cloud – Mary Oliver (Work 1.)

I am a woman sixty years old and of no special courage.
Everyday-a little conversation with God, or his envoy
the tall pine, or the grass-swimming cricket.
Everyday-I study the difference between water and stone.
Everyday-I stare at the world;  I push the grass aside
and stare at the world.

The spring pickerel in the burn and shine of the tight-
packed water;
the sweetness of the child on the shore; also, its
radiant temper;
the snail climbing the morning glories, carrying
his heavy wheel;
the green throats of the lilies turning from the wind.
This is the world.

Comes the hunter under the red leaves;
come the hounds, on their stubbies;
like wind they pour through the grass,
like wind they pour up the hill;
like wind the twist and swirl in the long grass.

Everyday-I have work to do:
I feel my body rising through the water
not much more than a leaf;
and I feel like the child, crazed by beauty
or filled to bursting with woe;
and I am the snail in the universe of the leaves
trudging upward;
and I am the pale lily who believes in God,
though she has no word for it,

and I am the hunter, and I am the hounds,
and I am the fox, and I am the weeds of the field,
and I am the tunnel and the coolness under the earth,
and I am the pawprint in the dust,
I am the dusty toad who looks up unblinking
and sees (do you also see them?) the white clouds
in their blind, round-shouldered haste;

I am a woman sixty years old, and glory is my work.

Ed – Louis Simpson

Ed was in love with a cocktail waitress,
but, Ed’s family, and his friends,
didn’t approve. So he broke it off.

He married a respectable woman
who played the piano.   She played well enough
to have been a professional.

Ed’s wife left him…
Years later, at a family gathering
Ed got drunk and made a fool of himself.

He said, “I should have married Doreen.”
“Well,” they said, “why didn’t you?”

Crazy Peony – Kathryn Proulx

i don’t write odes

but god you are crazy awesome

yesterday

i saw neighbors pointing you out as they passed by but

this morning

my daughter broke you and

i’m glad she did it

because i got to put you in a mason jar

now

i get to look at you and think

you are gaudy and sweet

i am sure i hear you giggling

you are the dolly parton of flowers

a bright patch of pink

on my otherwise beige window sill

Lost – David Wagoner

Stand still.  The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you.
If you leave it, you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.

The Country – Billy Collins

I wondered about you
when you told me never to leave
a box of wooden, strike-anywhere matches
lying around the house because the mice

might get into them and start a fire.
But your face was absolutely straight
when you twisted the lid down on the round tin
where the matches, you said, are always stowed.

Who could sleep that night?
Who could whisk away the thought
of the one unlikely mouse
padding along a cold water pipe

behind the floral wallpaper
gripping a single wooden match
between the needles of his teeth?
Who could not see him rounding a corner,

the blue tip scratching against a rough-hewn beam,
the sudden flare, and the creature
for one bright, shining moment
suddenly thrust ahead of his time-

now a fire-starter, now a torchbearer
in a forgotten ritual, little brown druid
illuminating some ancient night.
Who could fail to notice,

lit up in the blazing insulation,
the tiny looks of wonderment on the faces
of his fellow mice, onetime inhabitants
of what once was your house in the country?

Happiness – Raymond Carver

So early it’s still almost dark out.
I’m near the window with coffee,
and the usual morning stuff
that passes for thought.
When I see the boy and his friend
walking up the road
to deliver the newspaper.
They wear caps and sweaters,
and one boy has a bag over his shoulder.
They are so happy
they aren’t saying anything, these boys.
I think if they could, they would take
each other’s arm.
It’s early in the morning,
and they are doing this thing together.
They come on, slowly.
The sky is taking on light,
though the moon still hangs pale over the water.
Such beauty that for a minute
death and ambition, even love,
doesn’t enter into this.
Happiness. It comes on
unexpectedly. And goes beyond, really,
any early morning talk about it.

Today – Billy Collins

If ever there were a spring day so perfect,
so uplifted by a warm intermittent breeze

that it made you want to throw
open all the windows in the house

and unlatch the door to the canary’s cage,
indeed, rip the little door from its jamb,

a day when the cool brick paths
and the garden bursting with peonies

seemed so etched in sunlight
that you felt like taking

a hammer to the glass paperweight
on the living room end table,

releasing the inhabitants
from their snow-covered cottage

so they could walk out,
holding hands and squinting

into this larger dome of blue and white,
well, today is just that kind of day.