I've been in need of poetry lately. Here are a few poems I found through Ted Kooser's (Nebraskan Poet Laureate)
American Life in Poetry.
Marry Me a senryu sequence
by Veronica Patterson of Colorado
when I come late to bed
I move your leg flung over my side�
that warm gate
nights you're not here
I inch toward the middle
of this boat, balancing
when I turn over in sleep
you turn, I turn, you turn,
I turn, you
some nights you tug the edge
of my pillow under your cheek,
look in my dream
pulling the white sheet
over your bare shoulder
I marry you again
Love Like Salt by Lisel Mueller of Illinois
It lies in our hands in crystals
too intricate to decipher
It goes into the skillet
without being given a second thought
It spills on the floor so fine
we step all over it
We carry a pinch behind each eyeball
It breaks out on our foreheads
We store it inside our bodies
in secret wineskins
At supper, we pass it around the table
talking of holidays and the sea.
Love Wornby Lita Hooper
In a tavern on the Southside of Chicago
a man sits with his wife. From their corner booth
each stares at strangers just beyond the other's shoulder,
nodding to the songs of their youth. Tonight they will not fight.
Thirty years of marriage sits between them
like a bomb. The woman shifts
then rubs her right wrist as the man recalls the day
when they sat on the porch of her parents' home.
Even then he could feel the absence of something
desired or planned. There was the smell
of a freshly tarred driveway, the slow heat,
him offering his future to folks he did not know.
And there was the blooming magnolia tree in the distance—
its oversized petals like those on the woman's dress,
making her belly even larger, her hands
disappearing into the folds.
When the last neighbor or friend leaves their booth
he stares at her hands, which are now closer to his,
remembers that there had always been some joy. Leaning
closer, he believes he can see their daughter in her eyes.
Bridal Veil Pouf---Sophisticated and Chic! - $85 (West Simsbury, CT)
In my dream, it was Christmas time and we were at a holiday party. I walked outside to get some air and I saw a ceramic figurine laying on the ground. It was a panda dressed as Santa and he was holding up a banner that read "Happy Honeymoon." I thought how funny it was that neither the panda (my favorite animal) nor the message fit with Christmas. I wanted to keep it because I knew I was about to go inside to get married.
Thank you knot.com. I could choose to let this freak me out. Or I could choose to be excited. I choose option three ... I'm going on vacation!
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