Poetry

DPF / Oliver

Posted by

0

For winter birds, from poetryfoundation.org. The rest of the poem may be found here: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poem/30876

from White-Eyes / by Mary Oliver, b. 1935

like stars, or the feathers
      of some unimaginable bird

that loves us,
        that is asleep now, and silent—
          that has turned itself
            into snow.

DPF / O’Callaghan

Posted by

0

For wind and woods and wishes for rain and prayers for those with too much of it, from poetryfoundation.org.

from January Drought / by Conor O’Callaghan

But tonight is buckets of stars as hard and dry as dimes.

DPF / Mcclellan

Posted by

0

For Tennessee and yellow-coated gems, from poetryfoundation.org.

from A January Dandelion / by George Marion McClellan (1860-1934)

All Nashville is a chill. And everywhere
Like desert sand, when the winds blow,
There is each moment sifted through the air,
A powdered blast of January snow.

DPF / Bryant

Posted by

0

For frozen mist and wavering flakes, from poetryfoundation.org.

from The Snow-Shower / by William Cullen Bryant

Here delicate snow-stars, out of the cloud,
   Come floating downward in airy play,
Like spangles dropped from the glistening crowd
   That whiten by night the milky way

DPF / Wiman

Posted by

0

For 15-degree football games and other ways to witness winter, from poetryfoundation.org.

from This Inwardness, This Ice / by Christian Wiman, b. 1966

This inwardness, this ice,
this wide boreal whiteness

DPF / Bentley

Posted by

2

For parents, teachers, and parent-teachers, and anyone who teaches anyone any one valuable thing, from poetryfoundation.org.

from On Education / by Elizabeth Bentley, December 1789

Point out betimes the course they should pursue;
Then with redoubled pleasure shall you view
Their reason strengthen as their years increase,

DPF / Violi

Posted by

0

For bent trees flies and bees, from poetryfoundation.org.

from Resolution / by Paul Violi (1944-2011)

Whereas the porch screen sags from
the weight of flowers (impatiens) that grew
against it, then piles of wet leaves,
then drifted snow; and

 

Whereas, now rolled like absence in its
drooping length, a dim gold wave,
sundown’s last, cast across a sea of clouds
and the floating year, almost reaches
the legs of the low-slung chair

DPF / Chasar

Posted by

0

For Gabriellan trumpets and beaches on Christmas Day, from poetryfoundation.org.

from Conches on Christmas / by Mike Chasar

Diluvian, draggled and derelict posse, this
barnacled pod so pales
next to everything we hear of red tides and pilot whales
that a word like “drama” makes me sound remiss

 

except that there
was a kind of littoral drama in the way the shells
silently, sans the heraldry of bells,
neatly, sans an astrological affair,

 

and swiftly, sans a multitude of feet, flat-out arrived—
an encrusted school of twenty-four
Gabriellan trumpets at my beach house door

DPF / Anonymous

Posted by

0

For the 9th day of Christmas, maybe, if this is how it’s counted, from poetryfoundation.org. And, a happy belated Hanukkah, and a happy upcoming Kwanzaa!

from The Twelve Days of Christmas / by Anonymous

The ninth day of Christmas,
My true love sent to me
Nine drummers drumming,
Eight maids a-milking,
Seven swans a-swimming,
Six geese a-laying,
Five gold rings,
Four colly birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves, and
A partridge in a pear tree.

DPF / Williams

Posted by

0

For sugar and mysteries, from poetryfoundation.org.

from To Mrs. K_____, On Her Sending Me an English Christmas Plum-Cake at Paris / by Helena Maria Williams (1761-1827)

For magic surely lurks in this,
A cake that tells of vanished bliss;