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Poem-a-day

Rain All Night, Paris

On the road home the tide is rising.

Riding the road-tide is dangerous 
but it’s not safe to stand still. 
Hang on the verge & you drown.

I’m going along for the tide. 
I may see more riders further on. 
Drowning must wait till I get there

and who knows who might be waiting 
with a flashlight, a thermos, 
even a raft or canoe. 

“Rain All Night, Paris” from SPRINGING: NEW AND SELECTED POEMS by Marie Ponsot, copyright © 2002 by Marie Ponsot. Used by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. All rights reserved.

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Marie Ponsot

Marie Ponsot
Photo credit: Brian Palmer
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About Poem-a-Day

Poem-a-Day is the original and only daily digital poetry series featuring over 250 new, previously unpublished poems by today’s talented poets each year. Khaled Mattawa is the Guest Editor of December. Read or listen to a Q&A with Mattawa about his curatorial process, and learn more about the 2025 Guest Editors. Support Poem-a-Day.  

If you have any questions about Poem-a-Day, visit our Poem-a-Day FAQ.

Previous Poems

Title Author Date
Hawk Daniel Waters 05/16/2009
Blue or Green James Galvin 05/14/2009
The Hug Thom Gunn 05/13/2009
deer & salt block Joshua Marie Wilkinson 05/12/2009
Intensities of Emphasis and Wonder Farrah Field 05/11/2009
Lullaby in Blue Betsy Sholl 05/10/2009
Poetry as Insurgent Art [I am signaling you through the flames] Lawrence Ferlinghetti 05/08/2009
Dangerous Astronomy Sherman Alexie 05/08/2009
How Simile Works Albert Goldbarth 05/07/2009
Ode on Dictionaries Barbara Hamby 05/06/2009

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