Friday, February 29, 2008

609. At the Un-National Monument Along the Canadian Border - William Stafford

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. This is the field where the battle did not happen, where the unknown soldier did not die. This is the field where grass joined hands, wher...
Wednesday, February 27, 2008

608. Keats - Christopher Howell

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. When Keats, at last beyond the curtain of love’s distraction, lay dying in his room on the Piazza di Spagna, the melody of the Bernini Fou...
Tuesday, February 26, 2008

607. Lines & Circularities - Howard Nemerov

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On Hearing Casals' Recording the the Sixth Suite Deep in a time that cannot come again Bach thought it through, this lonely and immense ...
Monday, February 25, 2008

606. A New Poet - Linda Pastan

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. Finding a new poet is like finding a new wildflower out in the woods. You don't see its name in the flower books, and nobody you tell ...
Saturday, February 23, 2008

605. Otherwise - Jane Kenyon

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(Jane Kenyon died several years ago of cancer.) I got out of bed on two strong legs. It might have been otherwise. I ate cereal, sweet milk,...
Friday, February 22, 2008

604. Selecting A Reader - Ted Kooser

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. First, I would have her be beautiful, and walking carefully up on my poetry at the loneliest moment of an afternoon, her hair still damp a...
Thursday, February 21, 2008

603. The Dead Man's Clothes - Pat Boran

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. The dead man's clothes were willed to the village orphans so that, those long summer evenings, he was everywhere, moving through the f...
Wednesday, February 20, 2008

602. On My Return - Yehuda Amichai

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Translated from the Hebrew by Yehuda Amichai and Ted Hughes I will not be greeted on by return by children's voices, or by the barking o...
Tuesday, February 19, 2008

601. Variations On The Word Love

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. This is a word we use to plug holes with. It’s the right size for those warm blanks in speech, for those red heart- shaped vacancies on th...
Monday, February 18, 2008

600. 27-Nerisa del Carmen Guevara

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. And by the time I reach 80 I would have fallen in love with An entire city. All the people on the streets Would follow me down with A know...
Saturday, February 16, 2008

599. You Who Never Arrived - Rainer Maria Rilke

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. You who never arrived in my arms, Beloved, who were lost from the start, I don’t even know what songs would please you. I have given up tr...
Friday, February 15, 2008

598. At Seven-Mile Ranch, Cornstock, Texas

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. I live like I know what I’m doing. When I hand the horses a square of hay, when I walk the road of stones or chew on a cac...
Thursday, February 14, 2008

597. Outside History - Eavan Boland

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. These are outsiders, always. These stars— these iron inklings of an Irish January, whose light happened thousands of years before our pain...
Wednesday, February 13, 2008

596. Donald - James Kavanaugh

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. Donald lives with his mother and everyone says that's ridiculous For a forty-two-year-old man with a good job. But Donald tried making...
Monday, February 11, 2008

595. Equations Of A Villanelle - Howard Nemerov

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. The breath within us is the wind without, In interchange unnoticed all our lives. What if the same be true of world and thought? Air is th...
Friday, February 08, 2008

594. Landscape - Wislawa Szymborska

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Translated from the Polish by Joanna Trzeciak In an old master's landscape trees take root beneath the oil paint, the path clearly leads...
Thursday, February 07, 2008

593. Hommages - Tomas Tranströmer

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Translated from the Swedish by Robin Fulton Walked along the antipoetic wall. Die Mauer. Don't look over. It wants to surround our a...
Wednesday, February 06, 2008

592. POEM - Muriel Rukeyser

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. I lived in the first century of world wars. Most mornings I would be more or less insane. The news would pour out of various devices The n...
Tuesday, February 05, 2008

591. The Handbell Choir - Jane Flanders

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. Twelve children, twelve gray geese in starched collars, file onstage. Like their bells, which are set out buffet-style on a long table, th...
Monday, February 04, 2008

590. Dorie Off To Atlanta - Mark Halliday

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. Jen? Hi, it’s Dorie. I’m on the bus to LaGuardia. … Atlanta. What? … Maybe. I’m not really sure. I mean his schedule is so whacked, y...