Denise Levertov: Clouds
as if death had lit a pale light
in your flesh, your flesh
was cold to my touch, or not cold
but cool, cooling
Abby Zimet: John Prine as Tender Poet
“If his songs were allowed to exist in the world—so simply written, so profoundly beautiful —surely there was room for other good, decent things, too.”
Emily Dickinson: Grief is a Mouse
Grief is a Thief—quick startled—
Pricks His Ear—report to hear
Of that Vast Dark—
That swept His Being—back—
Walt Whitman: When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom’d
For the sweetest, wisest soul of all my days and lands—and this for his dear sake,
Lilac and star and bird twined with the chant of my soul,
There in the fragrant pines and the cedars dusk and dim.
Edna St. Vincent Millay: Dirge without Music
Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave
Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind…
Luray Gross: If Two People Are Aware of the Rising Moon
When his mind grew empty
and his heartbeat slowed to a vague stutter,
our father no longer walked the fields at night.
Jay Carson: Michael
On his route with a load of papers on his head,
he wasn’t tough enough to scare Michael
who socked him so hard papers flew
like peace doves all over Fifth Avenue.
Frida Berrigan: Liz McAlister’s fearsome mom-ness
The world may know her as an antiwar leader, a fearless Plowshares activist and the wife of Phil Berrigan, but to her children Liz McAlister is simply mom — and … Continue reading
Yana Djin: April Elegy
again April is here
with its sun of brass
and its moon of steel
Carolyn Gregory: Leaving the Theatre of Dreams (for Peter)
Tonight I walk through spring sadness, the nostalgia of dreams remembered and foregone, familiar places where we wrote our own epitaph, misspoken lines and rooms seen in the wrong light … Continue reading
Frida Berrigan: Parenting the Climate-Change Generation
Young people across the world are striking to draw attention to the ravages of climate change. They are demanding — with their bodies and their voices — that the catastrophe each of them will inherit be a priority for the grown-ups around them.
John Samuel Tieman: Elegy for a Poet
Michael Castro 1945 – 2018 while the snow wants to melt winter loiters and I will listen I will listen for you when I need a noun a sudden muscle an animal can use to … Continue reading
Frida Berrigan: The Cheetah in Us All
A mother thinks about the inheritance of children. “I don’t want to live in a world without cheetahs, Mom.” Seamus loves cheetahs and what’s not to love — unless you … Continue reading
Philip F. Clark: Lacrimosa
Where I grew up, wakes were a sparring ground— furor was the only defense to grief. Someone had to fight the rant of all those flowers. That is how … Continue reading
Vox Populi 