Michael T. Young | The Secular Sublime: An Appreciation of Gerald Stern
Stern’s poems are deceptively simple. He writes in a language completely devoid of pretense and yet dignified with the elegance of profound meditation.
Alison Hurwitz: On Resilience
In 8th grade English class my son’s assigned
a sonnet, asked to find an image, select
one metaphor that can expand to bind
disparate thoughts together.
William Blake and Catherine Boucher: Four Images from The First Book of Urizen
The globe of life-blood trembled
Branching out into roots:
Fib’rous, writhing upon the winds:
Fibres of blood, milk and tears
Chard deNiord: Meadow Altar
So, he spoke
to his horses, now loosed from the wagon and grazing
nearby with heads bowed to the fescue and rye,
as if also praying, which, of course, they had no need
to do, blessed and saved as they were already
Moudi Sbeity: Watching the Tall Burly Man at the Ice Cream Shop Lick His Cone
I watched him walk away from the register,
all rough and tarnished, hard in the heart –
I could tell – even mad in the eyes, lifting the
cone to his slightly cocked head, tongue sticking
out, wiping itself in a swirl along the sugar spire.
Sean Sexton: Heavenward
An orange glow back-lights the sky before dawn
with approaching newness made of blue. The world
still drips from a perfect midafternoon rain arriving
yesterday to carry into dark.
Michael Simms: Serenity Park
Out of the chaos of the parrots’ desperate calls had emerged a texture of beautiful sound, and none of them would ever be lonely again.
Edna St. Vincent Millay: ‘She had a horror he would die at night’
She had a horror he would die at night.
And sometimes when the light began to fade
She could not keep from noticing how white
The birches looked and then she would be afraid
Thomas A. Thomas: While hearing the poet
when love was blue water in a green cathedral
under a new blue sky and the water fell from
cliff stone into sun-sparkled air
Penelope Moffet: Peace March
Carry your light out into the shitstorm,
Joan Baez writes, and what a swirl of turds
it is.
Sally Bliumis-Dunn: The Cypress and the Stag
Now it all makes sense:
the roots of the cypress tree
to hold the boy’s sorrow in place
Rosaly DeMaios Roffman: How My Father Does It
Tomorrow, I fly home to teach Prometheus—
that story of saving the universe with fire
and then enduring the eagle punishment
but my raised voice will be for my father
Byron Hoot: Dance Instructor & There Are Reasons
“Now you. Just remember
when you were a bear.”
Diane di Prima: Buddhist New Year Song
it is truth, that we came here, I told you,
from other planets
where we were lords, we were sent here,
for some purpose
