Then I was a safe house
for the problem that chose me.
Like pure math, my results
were useless for industry:
not a clear constellation,
a scattered cluster, a bound
gap. When I looked I found
an explorer bent. Love
never dies a natural death.
It happens in a moment.
Everything hinges on
a delicate understanding.
Even the most trusted caregiver
is only trusted for so long.
From Late Empire (Copper Canyon Press, 2017). Copyright © 2017 by Lisa Olstein. Used with the permission of the author.
For fear of prowling beasts at night
They blocked the cave;
Women and children hid from sight,
Men scarce more brave.
For fear of warrior's sword and spear
They barred the gate;
Women and children lived in fear,
Men lived in hate.
For fear of criminals today
We lock the door;
Women and children still to stay
Hid evermore.
Come out! Ye need no longer hide!
What fear you now?
No wolf or lion waits outside–
Only a cow.
Come out! The world approaches peace,
War nears its end;
No warrior watches your release–
Only a friend.
Come out! The night of crime has fled–
Day is begun;
Here is no criminal to dread–
Only your son.
The world, half yours, demands your care,
Waken and come!
Make it a woman's world; safe, fair,
Garden and home.
This poem is in the public domain.
You do not seem to realise that beauty is a liability rather than
an asset—that in view of the fact that spirit creates form we are justified in supposing
that you must have brains. For you, a symbol of the unit, stiff and sharp,
conscious of surpassing by dint of native superiority and liking for everything
self-dependent, anything an
ambitious civilisation might produce: for you, unaided to attempt through sheer
reserve, to confute presumptions resulting from observation, is idle. You cannot make us
think you a delightful happen-so. But rose, if you are brilliant, it
is not because your petals are the without-which-nothing of pre-eminence. You would look, minus
thorns—like a what-is-this, a mere
peculiarity. They are not proof against a worm, the elements, or mildew
but what about the predatory hand? What is brilliance without co-ordination? Guarding the
infinitesimal pieces of your mind, compelling audience to
the remark that it is better to be forgotten than to be remembered too violently,
your thorns are the best part of you.
This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on March 4, 2018, by the Academy of American Poets.
after James Wright
Startled by my breath it bolts
to the other end of the field.
The horizon’s brow rasps
against a green cloud
which seems both
desperate and sincere.
Into a dead tree
a flame of bird
drives its burning beak.
And somewhere out here
I have come to terms
with my brother’s suicide.
I wish the god of this place
would put me in its mouth
until I dissolve, until
the field doesn’t end
and I am broken open
like a shotgun,
swabbed clean.
Copyright © 2012 by Matt Rasmussen. Used with permission of the author.