The Poetry Playground

Moon, Flowers, Man

I raise my cup and invite
The moon to come down from the
Sky. I hope she will accept
Me. I raise my cup and ask
The branches, heavy with flowers,
To drink with me. I wish them
Long life and promise never
To pick them. In company
With the moon and the flowers,
I get drunk, and none of us
Ever worries about good
Or bad. How many people
Can comprehend joy? I
Have wine and moon and flowers.
Who else do I want for drinking companions?

~ Su Tung P’o
(translated by Kenneth Rexroth)

Gift
A day so happy.
Fog lifted early, I worked in the garden.
Hummingbirds were stopping over honeysuckle flowers.
There was no thing on earth I wanted to possess.
I knew no one worth my envying him.
Whatever evil I had suffered, I forgot.
To think that once I was the same man did not
embarrass me.
In my body I felt no pain.
When straightening up, I saw the blue sea and sails.
~ Czeslaw Milosz

Little Things
Little things I’ll give to you-
Till your fingers learn to press
Gently
On a loveliness;

Little things and new-
Till your fingers learn to hold
Love that’s fragile,
Love that’s old.

~ Marion Strobel

Years From Now
Although I cannot see your face
As you flip through these poems awhile,
Somewhere from some far-off place
I hear you laughing – and I smile.

~ Shel Silverstein

Blue Hills Over the North Wall
Blue hills over the north wall;
White water swirling to the east of the city:
This is where you must leave me —
A longe puff of thistledown
on a thousand mile journey.
Ah the drifting clouds
and the thoughts of a wanderer!
The setting sun
and emotions of old friends.
A wave of the hand now
and you are gone.
Our horses whinnied to each other at parting.

~ Li Po (AD 701-762),
Trans. Innes Herdan

There is a Stream

There is a stream which rises
halfway down the mountain
My father showed it to me
place he found in a dream,
the withered spirit of an old Indian
leading him like a wisp of fog
to its banks
I shall go to the last water
when I am old
and my blood runs
like the sad Hudson River
heavy with the waste
of civilization
I shall go there
and wade into those clear ripples
where the sandy bottom
is spread with stones
which look like the bones
of beautiful ancient animals
I shall spread my arms
in that sweet water
and go like a last wash of snow
down to the loon meadow
in the last days of April.

~ Joseph Bruchac

Imaginary Conversation
You tell me to live each day
as if it were my last. This is in the kitchen
where before coffee I complain
of the day ahead – that obstacle race
of minutes and hours,
grocery stores and doctors.

But why the last? I ask. Why not
live each day as if it were the first –
all raw astonishment, Eve rubbing
her eyes awake that first morning,
the sun coming up
like an ingenue in the east?

You grind the coffee
with the small roar of a mind
trying to clear itself. I set
the table, glance out the window
where dew has baptized every
living surface.

~ Linda Pastan

Regenerate

Don’t be afraid of the process
The nights you kept yourself awake
Tossing and turning and shedding
Fifteen gallons of saltwater
Was only a way of exfoliating
Executing old skin cells
In preparation for a birth

After a few years you will be new
To walk the earth untouched
By the ghosts you thought
Would never let go

~ John Qeuor