1037. Missing the Boat - Naomi Shihab-Nye

.

It is not so much that the boat passed 

and you failed to notice it.

It is more like the boat stopping

directly outside your bedroom window, 

the captain blowing the signal-horn,

the band playing a rousing march.

The boat shouted, waving bright flags,

its silver hull blinding in the sunlight.

But you had this idea you were going by train.

You kept checking the time-table,

digging for tracks.

And the boat got tired of you,

so tired it pulled up the anchor

and raised the ramp.

The boat bobbed into the distance,

shrinking like a toy—

at which point you probably realized 

you had always loved the sea.

1036. Unloading The Elephants - David Wagoner

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Out of the sliding doors

Of steel-gray boxcars

The trunks come groping

Through the gray morning.

Where are we now?

The greatest show

Is on earth, trumpeting

Down the steep ramps and bracing

Forelegs against the heavy

Heavenly bodies

They so carefully balance

Like the commandments 

Shouted to massive heads, to ears

Pondering old orders,

Older than canvas.

Why are you keeping us?

In a huge row, seventeen

Elephants. Why must we learn

From you? What have we done

To be so weighted down?

Trunks raised, they shuffle forward

To the long parade.

1035. Ruins - Linda Pastan

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We picnic by these bleached ruins

a few miles from the village

where we bought this rough

bread and cheese, this bottle

of wine shaped

like a Cycladic goddess.

Nearby is Homer’s Aegean

where bathers in their sculpted

flesh, their beauty, might have been

the models for the limbs

now broken, the faces

fallen from the frieze

of this temple whose ruins

we love because they show

how life is both continuous

and brief and must

be honored with good wine,

with bread and cheese.

1034. I Love To See You - James Laughlin

in the box of paperclips on by desk

it’s a good place for you because I

can look at you when I’m telephoning

or typing a poem or putting poems in-

to the copy machine to send to maga-

zines that don’t want them    I tried

putting you in the little ormolu

frame where the daguerreotype of

great-grandmother Henrietta used to

be but it didn’t suit    you looked

too formal (you have lovely manners

but thank heaven you aren’t formal)

so I pushed up the paperclips in the 

box and leaned you against the heap

it can’t be very comfortable ( paper-

clips are harder than hay) but you’re

smiling away as if you loved it    I

hope you’re also smiling because you

love me so much you don’t care where

I keep you even in the paperclip box.

Her Reply

I like my picture to be in the box

where you keep your paperclips    I

imagine that when you reach for a

clip you are reaching out for me

it’s a gesture you’ve made a thou-

sand times (whenever you’ve needed

a clip) but now I hope it has be-

come different    given a new mean-

ing by my image    does the movement

of your hand now plead more for me

than thought or memory can    even

at this distance I feel the touch

of your fingers    do they feel they

are touching me    or must I become

again only the icon of my everyday

self as ordinary as your paperclips?