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  1. TopTop #4801
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    In a Dark Time


    In a dark time, the eye begins to see,
    I meet my shadow in the deepening shade;
    I hear my echo in the echoing wood—
    A lord of nature weeping to a tree.
    I live between the heron and the wren,
    Beasts of the hill and serpents of the den.


    What’s madness but nobility of soul
    At odds with circumstance? The day’s on fire!
    I know the purity of pure despair,
    My shadow pinned against a sweating wall.
    That place among the rocks—is it a cave,
    Or winding path? The edge is what I have.


    A steady storm of correspondences!
    A night flowing with birds, a ragged moon,
    And in broad day the midnight come again!
    A man goes far to find out what he is—
    Death of the self in a long, tearless night,
    All natural shapes blazing unnatural light.


    Dark, dark my light, and darker my desire.
    My soul, like some heat-maddened summer fly,
    Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I?
    A fallen man, I climb out of my fear.
    The mind enters itself, and God the mind,
    And one is One, free in the tearing wind.


    - Theodore Roethke
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  2. Gratitude expressed by 5 members:

  3. TopTop #4802
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Voyage


    I feel as if we opened a book about great ocean voyages
    and found ourselves on a great ocean voyage:
    sailing through December, around the horn of Christmas
    and into the January Sea, and sailing on and on


    in a novel without a moral but one in which
    all the characters who died in the middle chapters
    make the sunsets near the book's end more beautiful.


    —And someone is spreading a map upon a table,
    and someone is hanging a lantern from the stern,
    and someone else says, "I'm only sorry
    that I forgot my blue parka; It's turning cold."


    Sunset like a burning wagon train
    Sunrise like a dish of cantaloupe
    Clouds like two armies clashing in the sky;
    Icebergs and tropical storms,
    That's the kind of thing that happens on our ocean voyage—


    And in one of the chapters I was blinded by love
    And in another, anger made us sick like swallowed glass
    & I lay in my bunk and slept for so long,


    I forgot about the ocean,
    Which all the time was going by, right there, outside my cabin window.


    And the sides of the ship were green as money,
    and the water made a sound like memory when we sailed.


    Then it was summer. Under the constellation of the swan,
    under the constellation of the horse.


    At night we consoled ourselves
    By discussing the meaning of homesickness.
    But there was no home to go home to.
    There was no getting around the ocean.
    We had to go on finding out the story
    by pushing into it—


    The sea was no longer a metaphor.
    The book was no longer a book.
    That was the plot.
    That was our marvelous punishment.


    - Tony Hoagland
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  5. TopTop #4803
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    The Grounding of Stone



    Precious earth

    I feel your pulse, solid under my feet



    Our Mother carrying on her rhythms

    of day and night

    tide and wave


    In the wax and waning of her moon

    on into seasons – turning the wheel


    of another year nearly gone


    We wait

    we shelter

    we dream

    we hold tight to what we love

    we wholly wrap hope around our fear

    feeling in through our toes

    the ache of what matters



    we stand unbroken

    and dream our way to the other side

    grounded, solid and still

    unshakably trusting in each other



    - M. Mariette
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  7. TopTop #4804
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Try to Praise the Mutilated World


    Remember June's long days,
    and wild strawberries, drops of wine, the dew.
    The nettles that methodically overgrow
    the abandoned homesteads of exiles.
    You must praise the mutilated world.
    You watched the stylish yachts and ships;
    one of them had a long trip ahead of it,
    while salty oblivion awaited others.
    You've seen the refugees heading nowhere,
    you've heard the executioners sing joyfully.
    You should praise the mutilated world.
    Remember the moments when we were together
    in a white room and the curtain fluttered.
    Return in thought to the concert where music flared.
    You gathered acorns in the park in autumn
    and leaves eddied over the earth's scars.
    Praise the mutilated world
    and the gray feather a thrush lost,
    and the gentle light that strays and vanishes
    and returns.


    - Adam Zagajewski
    (Translation by Clare Cavanaugh)
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  9. TopTop #4805
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson



    Full Moon on the Fourth Day


    The days are tiring since we undertook the journey but because of that no less amazing. I often ask myself if my companions and I have not spent too much time in our observatories looking for causes in the stars. Since we left we have seen so much suffering, so much misery, so much kindness, so much joy in the common folk that has nothing to do with the stars.

    What is it that I will remember of the trip? The four birdies we heard sing on arriving at the village this evening? The moon so big and bright that it dims the star itself? The misery and the kindness of the people?

    Who knows what the memory chooses to keep. On the way we discussed so much the why of the trip itself. Who is this princeling who merits a star to announce his birth? Will he perhaps grow to be the king who will free his people from the yoke of the empire? ¿Or, like the present king, one who will accommodate to the yoke and under it prosper making himself more rich?

    Well, at least we are assured a great welcome by his parents. Without doubt they will feast us and load us with gifts even more rich than those we bring, and we shall set out on the return journey burdened with more riches than our three offerings.

    Be that as it may, I imagine that it will be this trip itself that is worth the trouble, what we learned of the suffering — and the capacity for joy —of the people. Or the singing of the four little birds. Or this moon, so near, so full, so brilliant that it overshadows the star itself and does not let me sleep.


    © Rafael Jesús González 2020


    Luna llena en el cuarto día


    Son cansados los días desde que empeñamos el viaje aunque no por eso menos asombrosos. A menudo me pregunto si yo y mis compañeros no hemos gastado demasiado tiempo en nuestros observatorios buscando causas en las estrellas. Desde que salimos hemos visto tanto sufrir, tanta miseria, tanta bondad, tanta alegría en la gente común que nada tiene que haber con las estrellas.

    ¿Qué es lo que recordaré del viaje? Los cuatro pajarillos que oímos cantar al llegar a la aldea esta tarde? ¿La luna tan grande y luminosa que ofusca a la estrella misma? ¿La miseria y la bondad de la gente?

    Vayamos a saber que es lo que escoge para guardar la memoria. Discutimos tanto en camino del porque del viaje mismo. ¿Quién este principillo que merece un lucero para anunciar su nacer? ¿Tal vez crecerá a ser el rey que libere a su pueblo del yugo del imperio? ¿O como el rey actual uno que se acomode al yugo y bajo él prospere haciéndose más rico?

    Bueno, a lo menos se nos asegura una gran bienvenida de sus padres. Sin duda nos festejarán y nos colmarán de regalos aun más ricos de los que traemos y saldremos en el viaje de regreso cargados de más riquezas que nuestras tres ofrendas.

    Sea como sea, me imagino que será este viaje mismo que valga la pena, lo que aprendimos del sufrimiento — y capacidad de alegría — de la gente. O el cantar de los cuatro pajarillos. O esta luna tan cerca, tan llena, tan brillante que opaca el lucero mismo y me espanta el sueño.

    © Rafael Jesús González 2020
    Last edited by Barry; 12-31-2020 at 11:46 AM.
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  10. Gratitude expressed by 3 members:

  11. TopTop #4806
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    A year of loss and chaos draws to a close.

    Stories from a thousand cultures remind us that the cosmos is born - and reborn again and again - from chaos.

    We have passed the darkest night of the year but the light only returns slowly.

    The old order has passed as well but the new is not yet apparent.

    Life does renew itself and new forms emerge as old ones pass away.

    It has always been this way.

    For all the misery of the past year, we have also seen astounding acts of beauty and courage and generosity.

    This liminal space we inhabit is a time to dream, to imagine and to plan.

    There are times when seemingly small acts can have out-size impacts.

    I believe that we are in one of these times - actually a hopeful time, a time of possibilities.

    Cynicism is as perilous a path as naïveté.

    Hope is a choice, not a feeling; we create it through our actions and through our words.

    At this turning of the wheel I invite and challenge you to dream grandly of the world you wish to bequeath, to proclaim it proudly and boldly and to join with your brothers and sisters to take the practical steps to make it real.

    Remember that every act of kindness bends the curve of our shared life toward love.




    A New Year’s Blessing

    Unhurried mornings, greeted with gratitude;
    good work for the hand, the heart and the mind;
    the smile of a friend, the laughter of children;
    kind words from a neighbor, a home dry and warm.

    Food on the table, with a place for the stranger;
    a glimpse of the mystery behind every breath;
    some time of ease in the arms of your lover;
    then sleep with a prayer of thanks on your lips;

    May all this and more be yours this year
    and every year after to the end of your days.

    - Larry Robinson

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  12. TopTop #4807

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Wonderful! Grateful for such a perfectly-articulated "Firstie" for 2021!
    And what a visionary phot! Best one yet!
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  13. Gratitude expressed by 2 members:

  14. TopTop #4808
    Ronaldo's Avatar
    Ronaldo
     

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Name:  HNY-2021.jpg
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  16. TopTop #4809
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    On Some Other Day



    on some other day

    i might sense the

    drift of jasmine

    breathing

    through my being



    on some other day

    i might feel the soft cool of fog

    the warmth of autumn-slanted sun

    dancing their magic

    on the skin of my hopes


    on some other day

    i might feel the love of my beloveds

    coursing through my veins

    as if they are

    my very being



    on some other day

    i might be hopeful

    for my progeny’s tomorrows



    on some other day

    i might know the nearness of angels



    perhaps

    some other day

    rises soon

    - Vilma Ginzberg
    Last edited by Barry; 01-02-2021 at 11:50 AM.
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  18. TopTop #4810
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    I Think That When I Die


    I think that when I die,
    I can breathe back the breath that made me live.
    I can give back to the world all that I didn't do.
    All that I might have been and couldn't be.
    All the choices I didn't make.
    All the things I lost and spent and wasted.
    I can give them back to the world.
    To the lives that haven't been lived yet.
    That will be my gift to the world
    that gave me the life I did live,
    the love that I loved,
    the breath that I breathed.


    - Ursula LeGuin
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  19. Gratitude expressed by 7 members:

  20. TopTop #4811
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Cento Between the Ending and the End




    Sometimes you don’t die


    when you’re supposed to


    & now I have a choice


    repair a world or build


    a new one inside my body


    a white door opens


    into a place queerly brimming


    gold light so velvet-gold


    it is like the world


    hasn’t happened


    when I call out


    all my friends are there


    everyone we love


    is still alive gathered


    at the lakeside


    like constellations


    my honeyed kin


    honeyed light


    beneath the sky


    a garden blue stalks


    white buds the moon’s


    marble glow the fire


    distant & flickering


    the body whole bright-


    winged brimming


    with the hours


    of the day beautiful


    nameless planet. Oh


    friends, my friends—


    bloom how you must, wild


    until we are free.


    - Cameron Awkward-Rich

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  21. Gratitude expressed by 7 members:

  22. TopTop #4812
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Hozho


    And you will see hozho all around you, inside of you.”
    This morning she is teaching me the meaning of HOZHO.
    It is dawn.
    The sun is conquering the sky and my grandmother and I
    are heaving prayers at the horizon.
    “Show me something unbeautiful,” she says,
    “and I will show you the veil over your eyes and take it away.

    There is no direct translation from Diné Bizaad,
    the Navajo language, into English
    but every living being knows what hozho means.
    Hozho is every drop of rain,
    every eyelash, every leaf on every tree,
    every feather on the bluebird’s wing.
    Hozho is undeniable beauty.
    Hozho is in every breath that we give to the trees.
    And in every breath they give to us in return.
    Hozho is reciprocity.
    My grandmother knows the meaning of hozho well.
    For she speaks a language that grew out of the desert floor
    like red sandstone monoliths that rise like arms out of the earth
    praising creation for all its brilliance.
    Hozho is remembering that you are a part of this brilliance.
    It is finally accepting that, yes, you are a sacred song that
    brings the Diyin Dine’é, the gods, to their knees
    in an almost unbearable ecstasy.
    Hozho is remembering your own beauty.
    My grandmother knows hozho well
    For she speaks the language of a Lukachukai snowstorm
    the sound of hooves hitting the earth on birthdays.
    For my grandmother is a midwife and she is fluent in the
    language of suffering mothers
    of joyful mothers
    of handing glowing newborns to their creator.
    Hozho is not something you can experience on your own,
    the eagles tell us as they lock talons in the stratosphere
    and fall to the earth as one.
    Hozho is interbeauty.
    My grandmother knows hozho well
    for she speaks the language of the male rain
    that shoots lightning boys through the sky,
    pummels the green corn children,
    and huddles the horses against cliff sides in the afternoon.
    She also speaks the language of the female rain
    that sends the scent of dust and sage into our homes
    and shoots rainbows out of and into the earth.
    The Diné know what hozho means!
    And you know what hozho means!
    And deep down we know what hozho is not.
    Like the days you walk in sadness.
    The days you live for money.
    The days you live for fame.
    The days you live for tomorrow.
    Like the day the Spaniards climbed down from their horses
    and asked us if they could buy the mountains.
    We knew this was not hozho.
    But we knew we could make it hozho once again.
    So we took their swords and their silver coins
    and melted them

    with fire and buffalo hide bellows
    and reshaped them into squash blossom jewelry pieces
    and strung it around their necks.
    Took the helmets straight off their heads
    and turned it into fearless beauty.
    Hozho is the healing of broken bones.
    Hozho is the prayer that carried us
    through genocide and disease,
    It is the prayer that will carry us through global warming
    and through this global fear that has set our hearts on fire.
    This morning my grandmother is teaching me
    that the easiest (and most elegant) way to defeat an army of
    hatred,
    is to sing it beautiful songs
    until it falls to its knees and surrenders.
    It will do this, she says, because it has finally
    found a sweeter fire than revenge.
    It has found heaven.
    It has found HOZHO.
    This morning my grandmother is saying
    to the colors of the sky at dawn:
    hózhǫ́náházdlíí’ hózhǫ́náházdiíí’
    hózhǫ́náházdlíí’
    beauty is restored again...
    It is dawn, my friends.
    Wake up. The night is over.


    - Lyla June Johnston
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  23. Gratitude expressed by 7 members:

  24. TopTop #4813
    Ronaldo's Avatar
    Ronaldo
     

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Navaho Basket:


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  26. TopTop #4814
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Burning the Old Year




    Letters swallow themselves in seconds.
    Notes friends tied to the doorknob,
    transparent scarlet paper,
    sizzle like moth wings,
    marry the air.


    So much of any year is flammable,
    lists of vegetables, partial poems.
    Orange swirling flame of days,
    so little is a stone.


    Where there was something and suddenly isn’t,
    an absence shouts, celebrates, leaves a space.
    I begin again with the smallest numbers.


    Quick dance, shuffle of losses and leaves,
    only the things I didn’t do
    crackle after the blazing dies.


    - Naomi Shihab Nye





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  28. TopTop #4815
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    26-1-1939




    When Barcelona fell, the darkened glass
    turned in the world and immense ruinous gaze,
    mirror of prophecy in a series of mirrors.
    I meet it in all the faces that I see.


    Decisions of history the radios reverse;
    Storm over continents, black rays around the chief,
    Finished in lightning, the little chaos raves.
    I meet it in all the faces that I see.


    Inverted year with one prophetic day,
    high wind, forgetful cities, and the war,
    the terrible time when everyone writes “hope.”
    I meet it in all the faces that I see.


    When Barcelona fell, the cry on the roads
    assembled horizons, and the circle of eyes
    looked with a lifetime look upon that image,
    defeat among us, and war, and prophecy,
    I meet it in all the faces that I see.


    - Muriel Rukeyser
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  29. Gratitude expressed by 5 members:

  30. TopTop #4816
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Defenseless under the night
    Our world in stupor lies;
    Yet, dotted everywhere,
    Ironic points of light
    Flash out wherever the Just
    Exchange their messages:
    May I, composed like them
    Of Eros and of dust,
    Beleaguered by the same
    Negation and despair,
    Show an affirming flame.


    - W. H. Auden
    (Excerpt from his longer poem "September 1, 1939")
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  31. Gratitude expressed by 5 members:

  32. TopTop #4817
    Jude Iam's Avatar
    Jude Iam
     

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    SEPTEMBER 1, 1939

    by W.H. Auden


    Auden: A poet for our times
    by Christopher Hitchens

    ​I sit in one of the dives
    On Fifty-second Street
    Uncertain and afraid
    As the clever hopes expire
    Of a low dishonest decade:
    Waves of anger and fear
    Circulate over the bright
    And darkened lands of the earth,
    Obsessing our private lives;
    The unmentionable odour of death
    Offends the September night.

    Accurate scholarship can
    Unearth the whole offence
    From Luther until now
    That has driven a culture mad,
    Find what occurred at Linz,
    What huge imago made
    A psychopathic god:
    I and the public know
    What all schoolchildren learn,
    Those to whom evil is done
    Do evil in return.

    Exiled Thucydides knew
    All that a speech can say
    About Democracy,
    And what dictators do,
    The elderly rubbish they talk
    To an apathetic grave;
    Analysed all in his book,
    The enlightenment driven away,
    The habit-forming pain,
    Mismanagement and grief:
    We must suffer them all again.

    Into this neutral air
    Where blind skyscrapers use
    Their full height to proclaim
    The strength of Collective Man,
    Each language pours its vain
    Competitive excuse:
    But who can live for long
    In an euphoric dream;
    Out of the mirror they stare,
    Imperialism's face
    And the international wrong.

    Faces along the bar
    Cling to their average day:
    The lights must never go out,
    The music must always play,
    All the conventions conspire
    To make this fort assume
    The furniture of home;
    Lest we should see where we are,
    Lost in a haunted wood,
    Children afraid of the night
    Who have never been happy or good.

    The windiest militant trash
    Important Persons shout
    Is not so crude as our wish:
    What mad Nijinsky wrote
    About Diaghilev
    Is true of the normal heart;
    For the error bred in the bone
    Of each woman and each man
    Craves what it cannot have,
    Not universal love
    But to be loved alone.

    From the conservative dark
    Into the ethical life
    The dense commuters come,
    Repeating their morning vow;
    'I will be true to the wife,
    I'll concentrate more on my work,'
    And helpless governors wake
    To resume their compulsory game:
    Who can release them now,
    Who can reach the dead,
    Who can speak for the dumb?

    All I have is a voice
    To undo the folded lie,
    The romantic lie in the brain
    Of the sensual man-in-the-street
    And the lie of Authority
    Whose buildings grope the sky:
    There is no such thing as the State
    And no one exists alone;
    Hunger allows no choice
    To the citizen or the police;
    We must love one another or die.

    Defenseless under the night
    Our world in stupor lies;
    Yet, dotted everywhere,
    Ironic points of light
    Flash out wherever the Just
    Exchange their messages:
    May I, composed like them
    Of Eros and of dust,
    Beleaguered by the same
    Negation and despair,
    Show an affirming flame.
    Last edited by Barry; 01-09-2021 at 12:01 PM.
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  33. Gratitude expressed by 6 members:

  34. TopTop #4818
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    In God’s Time

    A platitude meant to calm
    But what can it mean?


    God’s time is geologic,
    Susan says. Frustrated wishes and demands tell her this.
    She is right.


    So to know this particular God,
    We must become as patient as mountains,
    Sand or the very evolving beasts
    We already are. To know


    This odd God. We must shrug off
    Hurry and fearful fantasies,
    Learn to love the Unknown.
    To feel this God’s presence


    Learn to wait, wishing
    For no more than the waiting,
    Sweet for itself, for the
    Exquisite taste of timelessness.


    Learn to see God as
    The gourd that holds
    Gaseous new stars, baby birds, Wind and water.
    Watch how God’s time cradles felons
    Walking four square feet
    And refugees scaling fences Into the Unknown Present.


    This specific God’s time is geologic, despite Time’s
    Cruel evidence etched
    In the aging bodies
    We inhabit reluctantly.
    Silly how our egos demand
    We resolve the problems
    We create in our tiny time,


    While all around us
    Evidence of eternity
    Spins and sparkles
    If only we see and come
    To know we, too, are
    Geologic and timeless.


    - Rebecca del Rio


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  35. Gratitude expressed by 5 members:

  36. TopTop #4819
    Ronaldo's Avatar
    Ronaldo
     

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Glacier illustration 1875:
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    In-God's-Time.pdf

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  37. Gratitude expressed by 3 members:

  38. TopTop #4820
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Waves, Oceans and Flip-flopping


    think of a wave and then also, the ocean,
    a young branch and the trunk of a tree,
    a spent blossom and the stem of a rose,
    a broken heart and an act of forgiveness.


    each a willing sacrifice, a dying, a birthing,
    a doing what each was ordained to do.


    the branch, the perfect broken wing of the limb,
    the blossom, emitting the flower’s last fragrance,
    and forgiveness, the ultimate human reckoning.


    how can we be both the fallen branch and
    the sturdy tree itself, the rose and its fragrant
    scent, the broken heart and the one forgiving?


    by remembering that we are both human and divine,
    flip-flopping between tiny ephemeral splashes near
    the shore and then, in a moment, the vast expanse
    of the great ocean.

    of the great ocean itself.


    - Bruce Silverman

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  39. Gratitude expressed by 5 members:

  40. TopTop #4821
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Trying to Be Thoughtful in the First Brights of Dawn

    I am thinking, or trying to think, about all the
    imponderables for which we have
    no answers, yet endless interest all the
    range of our lives, and it's

    good for the head no doubt to undertake such
    meditation; Mystery, after all,
    is God's other name, and deserves our

    consideration surely. But, but -
    excuse me now, please; it's morning, heavenly bright,
    and my irrepressible heart begs me to hurry on
    into the next exquisite moment.

    - Mary OliverName:  IMG_9754.jpg
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  41. TopTop #4822
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    My Wish For You




    I wish you happiness
    Each and every day
    Mornings filled with pink golden clouds
    Laden with unlimited possibilities


    May this New Year
    Open doors in unexpected ways
    Bringing you renewed abundance
    Grace, ease and satisfaction


    May you be blessed with good health
    In mind, body and soul
    Untouched by the pandemic
    Still in the air around us


    May you always see rainbows
    Stretching across the heavens
    Leading your imagination
    Towards unknown treasures awaiting


    May the sunlight warm you
    Like the golden orange poppies
    Opening fully when touched by light
    Greeting the new day once again


    May the winds of time
    Blow softly from behind
    Gently moving you forward
    With strong, loving support

    May nature beckon you
    Venturing forth often into forests
    Meadows, beaches, anywhere nearby
    Reconnecting with the wonder of all


    May the waters run deep
    Clear, cool, rushing along
    Carrying you around all obstacles
    Flowing with life’s good intentions


    But most of all
    I wish you Love
    Love felt from within
    And from all your relations


    Knowing that you are always loved
    By family, special friends, community
    Loved by each breathe of air
    Graciously filling your body each moment


    In deep Gratitude
    I wish you Love
    From the depths of my heart
    And a New Year worth living


    - David Lieberstein
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  42. Gratitude expressed by 5 members:

  43. TopTop #4823
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Too Many Names




    Mondays are meshed with Tuesdays
    and the week with the whole year.
    Time cannot be cut
    with your weary scissors,
    and all the names of the day
    are washed out by the waters of night.


    No one can claim the name of Pedro,
    nobody is Rosa or Maria,
    all of us are dust or sand,
    all of us are rain under rain.
    They have spoken to me of Venezuelas,
    of Chiles and of Paraguays;
    I have no idea what they are saying.
    I know only the skin of the earth
    and I know it is without a name.


    When I lived amongst the roots
    they pleased me more than flowers did,
    and when I spoke to a stone
    it rang like a bell.


    It is so long, the spring
    which goes on all winter.
    Time lost its shoes.
    A year is four centuries.


    When I sleep every night,
    what am I called or not called?
    And when I wake, who am I
    if I was not while I slept?


    This means to say that scarcely
    have we landed into life
    than we come as if new-born;
    let us not fill our mouths
    with so many faltering names,
    with so many sad formallities,
    with so many pompous letters,
    with so much of yours and mine,
    with so much of signing of papers.


    I have a mind to confuse things,
    unite them, bring them to birth,
    mix them up, undress them,
    until the light of the world
    has the oneness of the ocean,
    a generous, vast wholeness,
    a crepitant fragrance.


    - Pablo Neruda


    (English version by Anthony Kerrigan)




    Demasiados nombres


    Se enreda el lunes con el martes
    y la semana con el año:
    no se puede cortar el tiempo
    con tus tijeras fatigadas,
    y todos los nombres del día
    los borra el agua de la noche.


    Nadie puede llamarse Pedro,
    ninguna es Rosa ni María,
    todos somos polvo o arena,
    todos somos lluvia en la lluvia.
    Me han hablado de Venezuelas,
    de Paraguayes y de Chiles,
    no sé de lo que están hablando:
    conozco la piel de la tierra
    y sé que no tiene apellido.


    Cuando viví con las raíces
    me gustaron más que las flores,
    y cuando hablé con una piedra
    sonaba como una campana.


    Es tan larga la primavera
    que dura todo el invierno:
    el tiempo perdió los zapatos:
    un año tiene cuatro siglos.


    Cuando duermo todas las noches,
    cómo me llamo o no me llamo?
    Y cuando me despierto quién soy
    si no era yo cuando dormía?


    Esto quiere decir que apenas
    desembarcamos en la vida,
    que venimos recién naciendo,
    que no nos llenemos la boca
    con tantos nombres inseguros,
    con tantas etiquetas tristes,
    con tantas letras rimbombantes,
    con tanto tuyo y tanto mío,
    con tanta firma en los papeles.




    Yo pienso confundir las cosas,
    unirlas y recién nacerlas,
    entreverarlas, desvestirlas,
    hasta que la luz del mundo
    tenga la unidad del océano,
    una integridad generosa,
    una fragancia crepitante.


    - Pablo Neruda
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  44. Gratitude expressed by 4 members:

  45. TopTop #4824
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    If any of you who read my poetry posts would like to receive them in your in-box after the demise of Wacco, you can send me a message at [email protected] and I will add you to the mailing list.

    Larry
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  46. Gratitude expressed by 2 members:

  47. TopTop #4825
    BManna
     

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    When Larry recently offered the poem "Dawn" I shared it with friends I thought would appreciate it as I do. They forwarded back the author speaking the poem aloud: https://asusjournal.org/issue-1/lyla...n-spoken-word/


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  48. Gratitude expressed by 3 members:

  49. TopTop #4826

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Oh, thank you sooo much for sharing this beautiful video of this beautiful poem. I watched and listened to it several times. I find so much peace and hope in it in these difficult times. "Wake Up--the night is OVER!!" Lilith

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  51. TopTop #4827
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    It’s Time


    Stop the digging
    There is no pony down here
    Despite the stink


    It’s time to look upward
    At the narrow ribbon of sky
    The climb will be steep—expect slippage
    Widen the ribbon until clouds appear


    Rain will come—more slippage
    Find the toe-holds and the handles
    Until the ribbon widens to a sash
    And the ascent reveals the true panorama
    Of sea-level possibilities
    The stars, the green earth


    Breathe deeply
    We have been disinterred
    Arising from a would-be grave
    The will to live surfacing
    And enabling a new shot at adventure
    And a new ability to recognize an abyss


    - Katherine Foster
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  52. Gratitude expressed by 4 members:

  53. TopTop #4828
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    The Ear That Speaks

    I have been a standing self in this world.
    I have braved both pleasure and disgust.
    I have lived my words.
    The stranger appeared and I did not look away.
    The crazy youth wandered by and I sometimes followed him.
    The virgin cried and I investigated her tears.

    I am a man, a person, an elder, shining and wise.
    I am someone who happily discovered the use of my ears.
    I am someone who happily discovered the use of my mind.
    I am someone who happily discovered the use of my heart.

    I meet the young people, the soldiers, the prisoners,
    The students, the poor people, the people of color,
    The Indians and the women of the planet,
    And I am not afraid of them.
    And for their part, they do not seem to be afraid of me.

    I sit and eat quietly the bread of resistance
    On the wrong side of the barricade.

    I am an elder, shining and wise.
    I have lived my words.
    I have discovered the use of my heart, my mind, my tongue.
    And for that reason alone, I have become devout,
    A listener devoted to the sound of the human voice.

    I have lived long enough to be able to tell you
    That I prefer it to sound happy.
    For the sake of the generations, I have become magic.
    I have become the ear that speaks.

    - Alice Walker
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  54. Gratitude expressed by 6 members:

  55. TopTop #4829
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    Quilts


    for Sally Sellers

    Like a fading piece of cloth
    I am a failure


    No longer do I cover tables filled with food and laughter
    My seams are frayed my hems falling my strength no longer able
    To hold the hot and cold


    I wish for those first days
    When just woven I could keep water
    From seeping through
    Repelled stains with the tightness of my weave
    Dazzled the sunlight with my
    Reflection


    I grow old though pleased with my memories
    The tasks I can no longer complete
    Are balanced by the love of the tasks gone past


    I offer no apology only
    this plea:


    When I am frayed and strained and drizzle at the end
    Please someone cut a square and put me in a quilt
    That I might keep some child warm


    And some old person with no one else to talk to
    Will hear my whispers


    And cuddle
    near


    - Nikki Giovanni
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  56. Gratitude expressed by 4 members:

  57. TopTop #4830
    Larry Robinson's Avatar
    WaccoBB Poet Laureate

    Re: Poem for the day from Larry Robinson

    "Why has there never been a coup in Washington D.C.? Because there is no U.S. Embassy in Washington D.C.”
    - Ira Kurzban attorney, following the 2004 U.S. Coup deposing Jean-Bertrand Aristide of Haiti.

    The Domino Apocalypse

    Albania, Argentina, Afghanistan,
    Guatemala, Ghana, Greece,
    Somalia, Syria,El Salvador,
    Haiti, Honduras,Palestine,
    Iran, Iraq, Indonesia
    Congo, Kosovo, Cambodia, Chile,
    Laos, Libya, Mexico, Myanmar,
    Panama, Pakistan, the Philippines,
    Brazil, Turkey, Zaire,
    the United States of
    America.**

    Looking for Four Horsemen,
    Babylon's Whore or
    A beast bearing a sign of
    XXX, we look for symbols where

    A mirror will suffice.
    The end times have arrived
    Have always been here, have come
    Home.

    - Rebecca del Rio

    **a partial list of the countries in which United States government officials, including presidents, have supported, authorized and/or engineered fascist coups.
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  58. Gratitude expressed by 3 members:

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