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  1. TopTop #3511
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

     Yes

    It could happen any time, tornado,
    earthquake, Armageddon. It could happen
    Or sunshine, love, salvation.
    It could, you know. That’s why we wake
    and look out—no guarantees in this life.
    But some bonuses, like morning,
    like right now,
    like noon,
    like evening.

    William Stafford
    Source: Passwords



    "Be joyful though you have considered all the facts." - Wendell Berry
    Last edited by Barry; 10-01-2017 at 01:43 PM.
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  3. TopTop #3512
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Sacrifice

    Can you feel that straining
    Open the eyes within your eyes
    Every particle of this and that
    The leaves and cigarette butts and
    The pavement
    Just trying to keep themselves intact
    Just trying to stay beautiful

    For you

    Fuchsia concentration is required
    To assume that same and pleasant form
    So that
    If every piece were to take even one breath

    They would scatter

    And expand

    All becoming all, signifying nothing

    To us

    Those delicate forms
    Who break
    And rearrange
    Ourselves
    And burn up in the friction

    Standing still, ancient trees watch us pass.
    As mothers
    watching children weep must abstain from their own tears,
    They are resolute in their suffering

    Crying out
    In silence

    "we must hold on"

    - Khalil Laltoo


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  5. TopTop #3513
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    In a Neighborhood in Los Angeles

    I learned
    Spanish
    from my grandma

    mijito
    don’t cry
    she’d tell me

    on the mornings
    my parents
    would leave

    to work
    at the fish
    canneries

    my grandma
    would chat
    with chairs

    sing them
    old
    songs

    dance
    waltzes with them
    in the kitchen

    when she’d say
    niño barrigón
    she’d laugh

    with my grandma
    I learned
    to count clouds

    to recognize
    mint leaves
    in flowerpots

    my grandma
    wore moons
    on her dress

    Mexico’s mountains
    deserts
    ocean

    in her eyes
    I’d see them
    in her braids

    I’d touch them
    in her voice
    smell them

    one day
    I was told:
    she went far away

    but still
    I feel her
    with me

    whispering
    in my ear:
    mojito

    - Francisco X. Alarcón
    (translated by Francisco Aragon)


    En un barrio de Los Ángeles

    el español
    lo aprendí
    de mi abuela

    mijito
    no llores
    me decía

    en las mañanas
    cuando salían
    mis padres

    a trabajar
    en las canerías
    de pescado

    mi abuela
    platicaba
    con las sillas

    les cantaba
    canciones
    antiguas

    les bailaba
    valses en
    la cocina

    cuando decía
    niño barrigón
    se reía

    con mi abuela
    aprendí
    a contar nubes

    a reconocer
    en las macetas
    la yerbabuena

    mi abuela
    llevaba lunas
    en el vestido

    la montaña
    el desierto
    el mar de México

    en sus ojos
    yo los veía
    en sus trenzas

    yo los tocaba
    con su voz
    yo los olía

    un día
    me dijeron:
    se fue muy lejos

    pero yo aún
    la siento
    conmigo

    diciéndome
    quedito al oído:
    mijito
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  7. TopTop #3514
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    What You Missed That Day You Were Absent from Fourth Grade


    Mrs. Nelson explained how to stand still and listen
    to the wind, how to find meaning in pumping gas,

    how peeling potatoes can be a form of prayer. She took
    questions on how not to feel lost in the dark.

    After lunch she distributed worksheets
    that covered ways to remember your grandfather’s

    voice. Then the class discussed falling asleep
    without feeling you had forgotten to do something else—

    something important—and how to believe
    the house you wake in is your home. This prompted

    Mrs. Nelson to draw a chalkboard diagram detailing
    how to chant the Psalms during cigarette breaks,

    and how not to squirm for sound when your own thoughts
    are all you hear; also, that you have enough.

    The English lesson was that I am
    is a complete sentence.

    And just before the afternoon bell, she made the math equation
    look easy. The one that proves that hundreds of questions,

    and feeling cold, and all those nights spent looking
    for whatever it was you lost, and one person

    add up to something.

    - Brad Aaron Modlin
    Last edited by Barry; 10-05-2017 at 02:13 AM.
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  9. TopTop #3515
    PElla's Avatar
    PElla
     

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Thank you... this one hit some deep place, where the real assignments were meted out. Like the one to watch the yellow jacket circle the piece of chicken we left out for him, and finally get lift off, but not be able to lift off high enough to fly back to the others. Circling lower and lower until he was down on the dirt. How that piece of chicken took him down. How he went down rather than let go. Seeing ants begin to gather and reach out and pull. And the other yellow jacket coming in, finding and circling round the downed one, his brother or his cousin, seeing him tugged on by ants. The ants, a line to the scene and a line away, and a cluster in motion around the downed yellow jacket, getting the right grip for pulling. His brother cousin still coming in, circling, crying out...

    Quote Posted in reply to the post by Larry Robinson: View Post
    What You Missed That Day You Were Absent from Fourth Grade
    ...
    Last edited by Barry; 10-05-2017 at 02:15 AM.
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  11. TopTop #3516
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    The Forgotten Dialect Of The Heart


    How astonishing it is that language can almost mean,
    and frightening that it does not quite. Love, we say,
    God, we say, Rome and Michiko, we write, and the words
    get it all wrong. We say bread and it means according
    to which nation. French has no word for home,
    and we have no word for strict pleasure. A people
    in northern India is dying out because their ancient
    tongue has no words for endearment. I dream of lost
    vocabularies that might express some of what
    we no longer can. Maybe the Etruscan texts would
    finally explain why the couples on their tombs
    are smiling. And maybe not. When the thousands
    of mysterious Sumerian tablets were translated,
    they seemed to be business records. But what if they
    are poems or psalms? My joy is the same as twelve
    Ethiopian goats standing silent in the morning light.
    O Lord, thou art slabs of salt and ingots of copper,
    as grand as ripe barley lithe under the wind's labor.
    Her breasts are six white oxen loaded with bolts
    of long-fibered Egyptian cotton. My love is a hundred
    pitchers of honey. Shiploads of thuya are what
    my body wants to say to your body. Giraffes are this
    desire in the dark. Perhaps the spiral Minoan script
    is not language but a map. What we feel most has
    no name but amber, archers, cinnamon, horses, and birds.

    - Jack Gilbert
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  13. TopTop #3517
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    The One Thing That Can Save America


    Is anything central?
    Orchards flung out on the land,
    Urban forests, rustic plantations, knee-high hills?
    Are place names central?
    Elm Grove, Adcock Corner, Story Book Farm?
    As they concur with a rush at eye level
    Beating themselves into eyes which have had enough
    Thank you, no more thank you.
    And they come on like scenery mingled with darkness
    The damp plains, overgrown suburbs,
    Places of known civic pride, of civil obscurity.
    These are connected to my version of America
    But the juice is elsewhere.
    This morning as I walked out of your room
    After breakfast crosshatched with
    Backward and forward glances, backward into light,
    Forward into unfamiliar light,
    Was it our doing, and was it
    The material, the lumber of life, or of lives
    We were measuring, counting?
    A mood soon to be forgotten
    In crossed girders of light, cool downtown shadow
    In this morning that has seized us again?
    I know that I braid too much on my own
    Snapped-off perceptions of things as they come to me.
    They are private and always will be.
    Where then are the private turns of event
    Destined to bloom later like golden chimes
    Released over a city from a highest tower?
    The quirky things that happen to me, and I tell you,
    And you know instantly what I mean?
    What remote orchard reached by winding roads
    Hides them? Where are these roots?
    It is the lumps and trials
    That tell us whether we shall be known
    And whether our fate can be exemplary, like a star.
    All the rest is waiting
    For a letter that never arrives,
    Day after day, the exasperation
    Until finally you have ripped it open not knowing what it is,
    The two envelope halves lying on a plate.
    The message was wise, and seemingly
    Dictated a long time ago, but its time has still
    Not arrived, telling of danger, and the mostly limited
    Steps that can be taken against danger
    Now and in the future, in cool yards,
    In quiet small houses in the country,
    Our country, in fenced areas, in cool shady streets.


    - John Ashbery
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  14. TopTop #3518
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Eve

    In our mythology, our literature, our world,
    There is at least one woman
    Who never experienced the loss of her mother.
    And that would be Eve.

    I say “at least” because
    The same would be true of Lilith.
    But, that’s another story, more hidden,
    And not Official, as it were.

    Not just the loss.
    The experience of a mother.
    Our unconscious memories of womb,
    Our infant’s recollection of face.

    To say nothing of how she fed us,
    Raised us, taught us, created us.
    As we flailed through adolescence,
    Repeating her own personal mistakes.

    Our rebellion and disavowal,
    Our rejections of her, her life experience.
    How it all came together, one way or another,
    And we finally saw her, the woman that she is.

    Perhaps too late? Or maybe not?
    But, Eve never knew her mother,
    Never had a mother, any mother.
    She was the only one, the only woman.

    Imagine having to figure that out
    On your own. No one before you
    To tell you it was normal, alas.
    And tell you to be proud of what you are.

    No wonder she wanted out!

    - Jon Jackson
    Last edited by Barry; 10-07-2017 at 02:05 PM.
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  16. TopTop #3519
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Forgiveness Is the Cash

    Forgiveness
    Is the cash you need.

    All the other kinds of silver really buy
    Just strange things.

    Everything has its music.
    Everything has genes of God inside.

    But learn from those courageous addicted lovers
    Of glands and opium and gold –

    Look,
    They cannot jump high or laugh long
    When they are whirling.

    And the moon and the stars become sad
    When their tender light is used for
    Night wars.

    Forgiveness is part of the treasure you need
    To craft your falcon wings
    And return

    To your true realm of
    Divine freedom.

    - Hafiz
    (translation by Daniel Ladinsky)
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  18. TopTop #3520
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Creighton Ridge Fire-Cazadero
    August, 1978

    Wednesday was hot, and so we thought we'd go to Goat Rock
    Me and Laurie and the kids were in the van
    But we looked back along the ridge and it was burning
    We grabbed our back pumps and our boots and then we ran
    Up Creighton Ridge to fight the fire a-comin' towards us
    Comin' faster, spreading' farther than we could
    The day we hoped we'd never see was all around us
    But we’ve got strength enough to do the things we should

    - Sara Scott
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  20. TopTop #3521
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Dear poetry lovers,
    I have been hiking in the Himalayas for the past week, out of internet range but acutely aware of the suffering of my Sonoma County community from the fires devastating our region. Before I left for the mountains I learned that many friends had lost their homes and others had been ordered to evacuate not knowing if they would have homes to return to.
    I offer this poem by John O' Donohue as medicine for all my friends and neighbors whose lives have been touched by this tragedy.
    Larry


    For Courage

    When the light around you lessens
    And your thoughts darken until
    Your body feels fear turn
    Cold as a stone inside,

    When you find yourself bereft
    Of any belief in yourself
    And all you unknowingly
    Leaned on has fallen,

    When one voice commands
    Your whole heart,
    And it is raven dark,

    Steady yourself and see
    That is your own thinking
    That darkens your world,

    Search and you will find
    A diamond-thought of light,

    Know that you are not alone
    And that this darkness has purpose;
    Gradually it will school your eyes
    To find the one gift your life requires
    Hidden within this night-corner.

    Invoke the learning
    Of every suffering
    You have suffered.

    Close your eyes.
    Gather all the kindling
    About your heart
    To create one spark.
    That is all you need
    To nourish the flame
    That will cleanse the dark
    Of its weight of festered fear.

    A new confidence will come alive
    To urge you toward higher ground
    Where your imagination
    Will learn to engage difficulty
    As its most rewarding threshold!

    -John O'Donohue

    "Be joyful though you have considered all the facts." - Wendell Berry
    Last edited by Barry; 10-18-2017 at 09:31 AM.
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  22. TopTop #3522
    Ronaldo's Avatar
    Ronaldo
     

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Kunzang Ahor, a 13 century Buddha in honor of Larry Robinson. —RonaldoName:  4Courge-G.gradient.jpg
Views: 1454
Size:  149.7 KB

    Quote Posted in reply to the post by Larry Robinson: View Post
    Dear poetry lovers,
    I have been hiking in the Himalayas for the past week, out of internet range but acutely aware of the suffering of my Sonoma County community from the fires devastating our region. Before I left for the mountains I learned that many friends had lost their homes and others had been ordered to evacuate not knowing if they would have homes to return to.
    I offer this poem by John O' Donohue as medicine for all my friends and neighbors whose lives have been touched by this tragedy.
    Larry


    For Courage...
    Last edited by Barry; 10-19-2017 at 09:11 AM.
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  24. TopTop #3523
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    After the Seventh Night of the Northern California Wildfires


    For seven nights there were no stars, only sky
    muted by smoke. On the first night, the dry bones
    of the past rattled the eaves of valley oaks
    on the hillside. Then, raging, hot-throated wind stirred
    and sparked flames. Until the mountain
    cracked open: red-lava heart pouring down.

    A man or a woman is most alone
    when he or she looks at the moon stained red,
    at the hillside glowing hot as a stoked furnace.
    Every house feels to be a single cell
    of the same beast: fragile and ignitable.

    And the days drift on – safety looming off
    horizon, a far-off ship. But so long
    as we can see far enough we never tire.

    - Iris Dunkle
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  26. TopTop #3524
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Fire Poem

    A piece of paper
    Drifted down
    From the sky
    Amidst the ash and dirt.
    The paper was part of a dictionary.
    It landed by the sanctuary door.
    The words defined were
    Tempest
    And
    Temple
    And so it was,
    From the tempest to the temple
    From the storm of fire to the sanctuary
    And on the edge of the page
    Partially charred
    The word
    Temporary…

    Scattered over rooms and fields
    The pieces of my life
    Are not to be gathered

    “Take your valuables,” they say.
    They are scattered
    They cannot be gathered.

    Ceaseless roaming
    Scattered memories
    Can all of what I care about
    Fit on this memory stick?


    - Barbara Hirschfield


    Last edited by Barry; 10-20-2017 at 01:03 PM.
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  28. TopTop #3525
    Chris Dec's Avatar
    Chris Dec
    Supporting Member

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Hope haiku

    A bird
    A bit of burnt string in her beak
    Weaves a smoldering nest.


    C.Dec 2017


    Last edited by Barry; 10-20-2017 at 05:40 PM.
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  30. TopTop #3526
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Night Without Sleep


    The world's as the world is; the nations rearm and prepare to change; the age of tyrants returns;
    The greatest civilization that ever existed builds itself higher towers on breaking foundations.
    Recurrent episodes; they were determined when the ape's children first ran in packs, chipped flint to an edge.


    I lie and hear dark rain beat the roof, and the blind wind.


    In the morning
    perhaps I shall find strength again
    to value the immense beauty of this time of the world, the flowers of decay
    their pitiful loveliness, the fever dream
    tapestries that back the drama and are called the future.


    This ebb of vitality feels the ignoble and cruel
    Incidents, not the vast abstract order.


    I lie and hear dark rain beat the
    roof, and the night-blind wind.


    In the Ventana country darkness and rain and the roar of waters fill the
    deep mountain throats.
    The creekside shelf of sand where we lay last August under a slip of stars
    And firelight played on the leaning gorge-walls, is drowned and lost. The
    deer of the country huddle on a ridge
    In a close herd under madrone-trees; they tremble when a rock-slide goes
    down, they open great darkness-
    Drinking eyes and press closer.


    Cataracts of rock
    Rain down the mountain from cliff to cliff and torment the stream-bed.
    The stream deals with them. The laurels are wounded.
    Redwoods go down with their earth and lie thwart the gorge. I hear the
    torrent boulders battering each other,
    I feel the flesh of the mountain move on its bones in the wet darkness.
    Is this more beautiful
    Than man's disasters? These wounds will heal in their time; so will
    humanity's. This is more beautiful...at night...


    - Robinson Jeffers

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    Last edited by Barry; 10-21-2017 at 08:30 AM.
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  31. Gratitude expressed by 4 members:

  32. TopTop #3527
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Mourning
    That other fire started from a love letter
    an irate forest service worker
    whose passion got the best of her
    in a CO campground with woodpeckers digging for worms a hawk
    wheeling above some scattered stars.
    This might have been a kiss from the earth
    a wake-up call, to evacuate our ways
    to get out of those metal boxes heating up atmosphere and oceans, if
    only we don’t hang up pretend it’s an aberration, if only
    we’d sit up and listen to the crackle, like so many, fleeing for their lives.
    How far can a crisis extend before ash turns to
    blackened dust in our hands and we forget
    what’s at stake? Eyes sting, throat raw, the lungs
    thick with days of smoke. Animals and people, gone.
    Homes full of photo albums, junk drawers, rubber bands, gone. Streets,
    hotels, lampposts, businesses, gone.
    Where will they sleep, in a county with a 1% vacancy rate before the
    calamity, this place within but not outside, that has no name,
    no residence, no country?
    This is our Syria, our war zone, racing from smoke and flames, waking up
    at 3am to check
    evacuation updates, fire containment, no power, boiling water, trying to
    locate friends and family, those who couldn’t run, elders on stretchers,
    glued to the radio, shelters overflowing. The language of disaster, a
    vocabulary none of us
    knew how to fit in our mouths, now rolling out fluently, like the masks
    covering our faces, ubiquitous, as if we have
    forgotten how to breathe in a world un-dominated by chaos.
    For hours at the shelter, I sort clothes, and toiletries,
    box them up, bring them in, go back for more.
    Trucks with supplies stop and unload: shoes, sun hats, diapers,
    hand sanitizer, shampoo, underwear, towels, soap. Generosity opens up my
    lungs,
    smoke closes them down. Grief and love, excitement
    and fear live in the same part of the brain, she says
    the heart burns up into tiny scraps and the only salve is
    more giving and this gratitude of breathing
    from sink to desk, back to phone, aimless, unmoored, wandering in
    unfamiliar territory
    the body exhausted
    these people, my community,
    suffering.

    - Claire Drucker
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  34. TopTop #3528
    markwjam's Avatar
    markwjam
     

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    beautiful...thank you

    Quote Posted in reply to the post by Larry Robinson: View Post
    Night Without Sleep...
    Last edited by Barry; 10-23-2017 at 03:55 PM.
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  36. TopTop #3529
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    For A New Beginning

    In out of the way places of the heart
    Where your thoughts never think to wander
    This beginning has been quietly forming
    Waiting until you were ready to emerge.
    For a long time it has watched your desire
    Feeling the emptiness grow inside you
    Noticing how you willed yourself on
    Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.
    It watched you play with the seduction of safety
    And the grey promises that sameness whispered
    Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent
    Wondered would you always live like this.
    Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
    And out you stepped onto new ground,
    Your eyes young again with energy and dream
    A path of plenitude opening before you.
    Though your destination is not clear
    You can trust the promise of this opening;
    Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
    That is one with your life’s desire.
    Awaken your spirit to adventure
    Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk
    Soon you will be home in a new rhythm
    For your soul senses the world that awaits you.

    - John O’Donohue
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  38. TopTop #3530
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Ordinary Heartbreak

    She climbs easily on the box
    That seats her above the swivel chair
    At adult height, crosses her legs, left ankle over right,
    Smooths the plastic apron over her lap
    While the beautician lifts her ponytail and laughs,
    "This is coarse as a horse's tail."
    And then as if that's all there is to say,
    The woman at once whacks off and tosses
    its foot and a half into the trash.
    And the little girl who didn't want her hair cut,
    But long ago learned successfully how not to say
    What it is she wants,
    Who, even at this minute cannot quite grasp
    her shock and grief,
    Is getting her hair cut. "For convenience," her mother put it.
    The long waves gone that had been evidence at night,
    When loosened from their clasp,
    She might secretly be a princess.
    Rather than cry out, she grips her own wrist
    And looks to her mother in the mirror.
    But her mother is too polite, or too reserved,
    So the girl herself takes up indifference,
    While pain follows a hidden channel to a deep place
    Almost unknown in her,
    Convinced as she is, that her own emotions are not the ones
    her life depends on,
    She shifts her gaze from her mother's face
    Back to the haircut now,
    So steadily as if this short-haired child were someone else.

    - David Levine
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  39. Gratitude expressed by 4 members:

  40. TopTop #3531
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Falling

    In these awe-filled days of fire and flood
    We watch and wait and wonder
    When that fierce hand
    Might reach at last for us.

    Those of us not yet touched by calamity
    Quake, knowing in our bones
    That though we may be spared
    This time, time will level us all.

    No magic amulets, no prayers,
    Good deeds or good looks
    Can promise protection
    From our terminal condition.

    And those who have watched a child
    Swept forever from our arms
    Or fled the flames that swallowed
    Our hopes and our memories

    Or hid from the bombs
    Or the predator’s gaze
    Know that nothing now will ever be the same -
    As if anything ever were.

    For all of us are falling
    Like ashes, like rain,
    Like petals or leaves;
    But we all are falling together.

    And if we knew, in truth,
    There was nowhere to land,
    Tell me: could we know the difference
    Between falling and flying?

    - Larry Robinson
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  41. TopTop #3532

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Very fine! Very much appreciated! In my opinion, an iconic poem for our time. One of those poems that gets inside me and reveals some of my private train of thought! I will share this onward (giving proper credit, of course)
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  42. Gratitude expressed by:

  43. TopTop #3533
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    In Blackwater Woods


    Look, the trees
    are turning
    their own bodies
    into pillars

    of light,
    are giving off the rich
    fragrance of cinnamon
    and fulfillment,

    the long tapers
    of cattails
    are bursting and floating away over
    the blue shoulders

    of the ponds,
    and every pond,
    no matter what its
    name is, is

    nameless now.
    Every year
    everything I have ever learned

    in my lifetime
    leads back to this: the fires
    and the black river of loss
    whose other side

    is salvation,
    whose meaning
    none of us will ever know.
    To live in this world

    you must be able
    to do three things;
    to love what is mortal;
    to hold it

    against your bones knowing
    your own life depends on it’
    and, when the time comes to let it go,
    to let it go.

    - Mary Oliver
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  44. Gratitude expressed by 4 members:

  45. TopTop #3534
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    God Bless The Grass

    God bless the grass that grows thru the crack.
    They roll the concrete over it to try and keep it back.
    The concrete gets tired of what it has to do,
    It breaks and it buckles and the grass grows thru,
    And God bless the grass
    .
    God bless the truth that fights toward the sun,
    They roll the lies up over it and think that it is done.
    It moves through the ground and reaches for the air,
    And after a while it is growing everywhere,
    And God bless the grass.

    God bless the grass that grows through cement.
    It's green and it's tender and it's easily bent.
    But after a while it lifts up its head,
    For the grass is living and the stone is dead,
    And God bless the grass.

    God bless the grass that's gentle and low,
    Its roots they are deep and its will is to grow.
    And God bless the truth, the friend of the poor,
    And the wild grass growing at the poor man's door,
    And God bless the grass.

    - Malvina Reynolds
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  46. Gratitude expressed by 3 members:

  47. TopTop #3535
    PElla's Avatar
    PElla
     

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Scrolling back through days of poems, I discovered what I'd missed... For Courage hit deep and fit, moved me to tears and fired another solid moment of courage moving it from belly through heart and throat. Bless all the reminders, as hard as they hit us, of why we stay, to remember it's the fire that gets us moving in the direction of what's true.

    Quote Posted in reply to the post by Ronaldo: View Post
    Kunzang Ahor, a 13 century Buddha in honor of Larry Robinson. —RonaldoName:  4Courge-G.gradient.jpg
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  48. Gratitude expressed by 3 members:

  49. TopTop #3536
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    The Words

    white hot and insufficient
    continue to fly the words fly
    from the corners of
    forgotten
    not-forgotten houses the
    words
    flame red and inconsistent

    insist

    on being said the words
    insist on resolutions
    vaguely made
    sometime last … do you remember?
    that fall flat
    jet black
    and incandescent the words
    refuse to be
    lifted
    refuse our reasons refuse to be used
    the words fail us fail me fail October
    yet everyone is talking about the fire

    my seven-year-old quietly says

    - Amy Elizabeth Robinson
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  50. Gratitude expressed by 3 members:

  51. TopTop #3537
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Choosing A Dog

    "It's love," they say. You touch
    the right one and a whole half of the universe
    wakes up, a new half.
    Some people never find
    that half, or they neglect it or trade it
    for money or success and it dies.
    The faces of big dogs tell, over the years,
    that size is a burden: you enjoy it for awhile
    but then maintenance gets to you.
    When I get old I think I'll keep, not a little
    dog, but a serious dog,
    for the casual, drop-in criminal —
    My kind of dog, unimpressed by
    dress or manner, just knowing
    what's really there by the smell.
    Your good dogs, some things that they hear
    they don't really want you to know —
    it's too grim or ethereal.
    And sometimes when they look in the fire
    they see time going on and someone alone,
    but they don't say anything.

    - William Stafford
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  52. Gratitude expressed by 6 members:

  53. TopTop #3538
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Ash Mothers


    We travel on the wings
    of the wind. We cover
    you. Part of us flies.

    Part falls. You cannot
    Ignore us. We come
    From the soul of fire.

    We are the remains
    Of your civilization,
    Of your obsession

    With the material.
    You cannot shoo us
    Away like you would

    A buzzing whirring
    Annoying yellow jacket.
    We are all over you

    And inside you now.
    We are white. We
    Are grey as elders.

    We are the particulate
    Of what you thought
    You owned, possessed.

    You touch us and we
    Cling to you insisting
    You remember Earth

    Is home to all of us
    Not a burned house.
    We are flying. We are

    Falling from the winds of
    Caprice in the ever arching
    Smoke. We make it hard for

    Any one to see. You must
    Look with your third eyes
    Into the worlds of Spirit.



    We infiltrate eyes, lungs
    With the toxicity you have
    Let loose upon our Earth.

    We make it hard to breathe.
    All the creatures feel the weight
    Of us although we are so light.

    The earthly beings sneeze
    And wheeze. We are the
    Remains of the fires. We

    Travel on fickle winds, reminding
    You we are all connected. We
    Cover your cars, your windows,

    Your benches, your plans, your hopes,
    Your dreams. We are Star Dust. We are
    Called your Ash Mothers. You can write

    Your life and death on essence. You can
    Choke on our redeeming power. You have
    No choice but to touch us and receive

    Our path. Follow us. We are returning
    You to your beginnings. We are taking
    You to your endings. We are all the Earth.

    You think we are disposable. We are that
    Of which you were created and to which
    You shall return. We cannot be undone.

    We cover you with the essence of all
    That has been incinerated. We are what
    Remains of the humans, the animals

    Fleeing the fires, of the insects humming,
    Birds singing, flowers blooming, grass
    Waving, coyotes howling, pumas lurking.

    We are telling you be ready. Admit we
    Are witnesses bound together in grief,
    fallen from the sky, blanketed with love,

    Landing on Earth, signalling rebirth.

    - Patria Brown
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  54. Gratitude expressed by 5 members:

  55. TopTop #3539
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Fire On The Hills

    The deer were bounding like blown leaves
    Under the smoke in front of the roaring wave of the brushfire;
    I thought of the smaller lives that were caught.
    Beauty is not always lovely; the fire was beautiful, the terror
    Of the deer was beautiful; and when I returned
    Down the black slopes after the fire had gone by, an eagle
    Was perched on the jag of a burnt pine,
    Insolent and gorged, cloaked in the folded storms of his shoulders.
    He had come from far off for good hunting
    With fire for his beater to drive the game; the sky was merciless
    Blue and the hills merciless black,
    The somber-feathered great bird sleepily merciless between them.
    I thought, painfully, but the whole mind,
    The destruction that brings an eagle from heaven is better than mercy.

    - Robinson Jeffers
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  56. Gratitude expressed by 4 members:

  57. TopTop #3540
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    When I Thought My House Would Burn

    When I thought
    It would burn, my house
    Would certainly join the
    Fire, become fuel
    Like so many others
    I imagined those papers
    Settled in deep boxes
    Slumbering in a storm
    And I was grateful
    I’d have no chore to undertake,
    No decisions to make.

    I imagined the roof, flat
    And sieve-like allowing
    Fire, like winter rains, to pour
    In and mercifully
    Choose what goes, what
    If anything, stays.

    I imagined books, photos,
    Paintings surrounded and
    Surrendered to the insatiable
    Appetite of destruction, so like
    My appetite for acquisition
    That leaves little to imagine,
    To fill with emptiness.

    Two years ago, I sifted
    Through years
    Of greeting cards Rich
    Could not part with until
    He parted with his life
    And left behind treasure
    Of no meaning to others.

    Returning home, I saw
    My own small history,
    Quietly cluttering corners
    Swallowing the present.
    Like fire, I swept through
    Drawers and cupboards,
    Clearing away the moments,
    The mementos of times
    Lived and asking remembrance.

    When I thought my house
    Had burned, was burning
    As I climbed out of Paro’s
    Narrow valley towards Tiger’s Nest
    I carried, not birthday cards,
    Not books or grandmother’s quilts and paintings,
    But the rabbits and squirrels,
    The pumas and skunks, deer
    And trees, tucked in my heart.
    I knew then what I loved.
    I know now what I will
    Carry when, like others
    Before me, I flee this life
    For the unknown, fires
    Of living fading behind me.

    - Rebecca del Rio
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  58. Gratitude expressed by 6 members:

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