poem Archives - Page 16 of 20 - Evanston Public Library

National Poetry Month: April 22nd

April 22, 2011

Long Gone Lonesome Blues by A.E. Stallings

Death was something that hadn’t happened yet.

I was driving in my father’s pickup truck

At some late hour, the hour of broken luck.

It seeped up through the dashboard’s oubliette,

Clear voice through the murk — the radio was set

Halfway between two stations and got stuck.

But the words sobbed through, and I was suddenly struck

Like a gut string in the key of flat regret.

The voice came from beyond the muddy river —

You know the one, the one that’s cold as ice.

Even then, it traveled like a shiver

Through my tributary veins — but twice

As melancholy to me now, because

I’m older than Hank Williams ever was.

This poem was selected by Jeff B. (Reader’s Services)

Poetry Copyright Notice

National Poetry Month: April 21st

April 21, 2011

Happiness by Raymond Carver

So early it’s still almost dark out.

I’m near the window with coffee,

and the usual early morning stuff

that passes for thought.

When I see the boy and his friend

walking up the road

to deliver the newspaper.

They wear caps and sweaters,

and one boy has a bag over his shoulder.

They are so happy

they aren’t saying anything, these boys.

I think if they could, they would take

each other’s arm.

It’s early in the morning,

and they are doing this thing together.

They come on, slowly.

The sky is taking on light,

though the moon still hangs pale over the water.

Such beauty that for a minute

death and ambition, even love,

doesn’t enter into this.

Happiness. It comes on

unexpectedly. And goes beyond, really,

any early morning talk about it.

This poem was selected by Rika Ghorbani (Reference Librarian)

Poetry Copyright Notice

National Poetry Month: April 20th

April 20, 2011

Don’t Go Far Off, Not Even for a Day by Pablo Neruda

Don’t go far off, not even for a day, because —

because — I don’t know how to say it: a day is long

and I will be waiting for you, as in an empty station

when the trains are parked off somewhere else, asleep.

Don’t leave me, even for an hour, because

then the little drops of anguish will all run together,

the smoke that roams looking for a home will drift

into me, choking my lost heart.

Oh, may your silhouette never dissolve on the beach;

may your eyelids never flutter into the empty distance.

Don’t leave me for a second, my dearest,

because in that moment you’ll have gone so far

I’ll wander mazily over all the earth, asking,

Will you come back? Will you leave me here, dying?

This poem was selected by Lesley W. (Reference Librarian)

Poetry Copyright Notice

National Poetry Month: April 19th

April 19, 2011

Mirror by Sylvia Plath

I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.

Whatever I see I swallow immediately

Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.

I am not cruel, only truthful —

The eye of a little god, four-cornered.

Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.

It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long

I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers.

Faces and darkness separate us over and over.

Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,

Searching my reaches for what she really is.

Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.

I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.

She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.

I am important to her. She comes and goes.

Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.

In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman

Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.

This poem was selected by Russell J. (Reader’s Services)

Poetry Copyright Notice

National Poetry Month: April 18th

April 18, 2011

Passing Remark by William Stafford

In scenery I like flat country.

In life I don’t like much to happen.

In personalities I like mild colorless people.

And in colors I prefer gray and brown.

My wife, a vivid girl from the mountains,

says, “Then why did you choose me?”

Mildly I lower my brown eyes —

there are so many things admirable people do not understand.

This poem was selected by Olivia M. (Reader’s Services)

Poetry Copyright Notice

National Poetry Month: April 17th

April 17, 2011

Selecting a Reader by Ted Kooser

First, I would have her be beautiful,

and walking carefully up on my poetry

at the loneliest moment of an afternoon,

her hair still damp at the neck

from washing it. She should be wearing

a raincoat, an old one, dirty

from not having money enough for the cleaners.

She will take out her glasses, and there

in the bookstore, she will thumb

over my poems, then put the book back

up on the shelf. She will say to herself,

“For that kind of money, I can get

my raincoat cleaned.” And she will.

This poem was selected by Mary H. (Reader’s Services)

Poetry Copyright Notice

National Poetry Month: April 16th

April 16, 2011

In Memory of My Mother by Patrick Kavanagh

I do not think of you lying in the wet clay

Of a Monaghan graveyard; I see

You walking down a lane among the poplars

On your way to the station, or happily

Going to second Mass on a summer Sunday –

You meet me and you say:

‘Don’t forget to see about the cattle – ‘

Among your earthiest words the angels stray. Continue reading →

National Poetry Month: April 15th

April 15, 2011

Forgetfulness by Billy Collins

The name of the author is a first to go

followed obediently by the title, the plot,

the heartbreaking conclusion, the entire novel

which suddenly becomes one you have never read, never heard of.

It is as if, one by one, the memories you used to harbor

decided to retire to the southern hemispheres of the brain,

to a little fishing village where there are no phones. Continue reading →

National Poetry Month: April 14th

April 14, 2011

The Fairies by William Allingham

Up the airy mountain

Down the rushy glen,

We daren’t go a-hunting,

For fear of little men;

Wee folk, good folk,

Trooping all together;

Green jacket, red cap,

And white owl’s feather.

Down along the rocky shore

Some make their home,

They live on crispy pancakes

Of yellow tide-foam;

Some in the reeds

Of the black mountain-lake,

With frogs for their watch-dogs,

All night awake.

High on the hill-top

The old King sits;

He is now so old and gray

He’s nigh lost his wits.

With a bridge of white mist

Columbkill he crosses,

On his stately journeys

From Slieveleague to Rosses;

Or going up with music,

On cold starry nights,

To sup with the Queen,

Of the gay Northern Lights. Continue reading →

National Poetry Month: April 13th

April 13, 2011

Choose Something Like a Star by Robert Frost

O Star (the fairest one in sight),

We grant your loftiness the right

To some obscurity of cloud —

It will not do to say of night,

Since dark is what brings out your light.

Some mystery becomes the proud.

But to be wholly taciturn

In your reserve is not allowed.

Say something to us we can learn

By heart and when alone repeat.

Say something! And it says “I burn.”

But say with what degress of heat.

Talk Fahrenheit, talk Centigrade.

Use language we can comprehend.

Tell us what elements you blend.

It gives us strangely little aid,

But does tell something in the end.

And steadfast as Keats’ Eremite,

Not even stooping from its sphere,

It asks a little of us here.

It asks of us a certain height.

So when at times the mob is swayed

To carry praise or blame too far,

We may choose something like a star

To stay our minds on and be staid.

This poem was selected by Margaret S. (Reference Librarian)