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Poem-a-day

Without Love

I cannot do without love
the way I make myself
do without food or sleep or sex
I cannot do without love

sometimes I rummage through
my papers
tendrils of dreams
thoughts from long ago
want to throw everything out
but can’t

did my laundry
read Doris Lessing
on the stairs in the sun
the one about
a man and two women

last night in your arms
a whisper in my ear
see how your heart beats
hard like a hammer

what are you thinking about
you are so far away

pow fahn for breakfast
steaming in rice bowls
snow heavy on the trees
like icing on a cake

your lover calls every night
demanding to know
if I am still here
and why the hell am I
still here
I cannot do without love

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Poems

15227 poems

One does such work as one will not,
And well each knows the right;
Though the white storm howls, or the sun is hot,
The black must serve the white.
And it’s, oh, for the white man’s softening flesh,
While the black man’s muscles grow!
Well I know which grows the mightier,

James D. Corrothers

1922

Compensation

O, rich young lord, thou ridest by
With looks of high disdain;
It chafes me not thy title high,
Thy blood of oldest strain.
The lady riding at thy side
Is but in name thy promised bride.
Ride on, young lord, ride on!

James Edwin Campbell

1922

A Poem for My Wife

I’m in my room writing
speaking in myself
& I hear you
move down the hallway
to water your plants

I write truth on the page
I strike the word over & over
yet I worry you’ll pour too much water on the plants
& the water will overflow onto the books
ruining them

If I can’t speak out of myself
how can I tell you I don’t care about the plants?
how can I tell you I don’t care if the books get wet?

David Meltzer

2005

I Have Folded My Sorrows

I have folded my sorrows into the mantle of summer night,
Assigning each brief storm its allotted space in time,
Quietly pursuing catastrophic histories buried in my eyes.
And yes, the world is not some unplayed Cosmic Game,
And the sun is still ninety-three million miles from me,
And in the imaginary forest, the shingled hippo becomes the gray unicorn.
No, my traffic is not with addled keepers of yesterday’s disasters,
Seekers of manifest disembowelment on shafts of yesterday’s pains.

Bob Kaufman

1965

Poets

4081 poets

Jackie Wang

Jackie Wang is the author of the poetry collection The Sunflower Cast a Spell to Save Us from the Void (Nightboat, 2021), which was longlisted for the National Book Award.

Janice Mirikitani

Janice Mirikitani was born on February 4, 1941, in Stockton, California.

Chen Chen

Chen Chen is the author of When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Further Possibilities (BOA Editions, 2017).

Meg Day

Meg Day grew up in California’s Bay Area and received a BA from the University of California, San Diego, an MFA from Mills College, and a PhD from

Kahlil Gibran

Kahlil Gibran, author of The Prophet, was born January 6, 1883, in Bsharri, Lebanon.