Friday, September 9, 2011

Strong Enough

It’s still my belief that all the insight into human nature I’ll ever need is in the poetry section.
~ Eden Kennedy


A mosaic of poetry this week:

Library of Congress by TakomaBibelot

from Chorus
by Antonella Anedda

Come, thoughts, let us think you deeply now that morning has come.
The light makes you seem strong enough to scrape off the darkness
as though we had a shard and the night were skin.

~~~~~~~~~

from Prayer
by Carol Ann Duffy

Some days, although we can not pray, a prayer
utters itself. So, a woman will lift
her head from the sieve of her hands and stare
at the minims sung by a tree, a sudden gift.

Some nights, although we are faithless, the truth
enters our hearts, a small familiar pain;
then a man will stand stock still, hearing his youth
in the distant latin chanting of a train.

~~~~~~~~~

from Suffrages
by Margaret Ingraham

In the iridescent dust of monarch’s wing
and secret places of my brokenness

In the turquoise ring encircling gannet’s eye
and secret places of my brokenness

In the frost’s filigrees that edge the alder leaves
and secret places of my brokenness

In slim filament of spider’s fragile weave
and secret places of my brokenness

~~~~~~~~~

from The Moment
by Margaret Atwood

The moment when, after many years
of hard work and a long voyage
you stand in the centre of your room,
house, half-acre, square mile, island, country,
knowing at last how you got there,
and say, I own this,

is the same moment when the trees unloose
their soft arms from around you,
the birds take back their language,

~~~~~~~~~

You can read the rest of any of the poems by clicking on the poem titles.

Today's Poetry Friday round-up is at Secrets and Sharing Soda.

6 comments:

Author Amok said...

Hi, Tabatha. I'm responding to "Chorus" in particular. That image of morning is so sharp -- I love moments like the gecko's appearance that call the observer awake.

Hope you had a great start to school!

GatheringBooks said...

For some reason, all these poems have made me pensive.

And yes, I do believe without a doubt that for a clear untarnished insight into human nature, one should open a book of poetry.

Felt sad reading Suffrages "secret places of my brokenness" now resounding in my head like a soft refrain.

david elzey said...

i've always preferred atwood's poems and prose over her novels, which are great but somehow don't capture me in the same way. nice mosaic this week!

madelyn said...

And I didn't even realize Atwood wrote poetry. When I was teaching creative writing (just as a teaching fellow) I had to teach poetry, too, and I tried to pair up people who did both short stories and poems. She would have been a great one!

Mary Lee said...

This line jumped out at me:
"the distant latin chanting of a train."

We live near train tracks. I'll be listening for latin chanting next time one passes!

Robyn Hood Black said...

Thoughtful, melancholy selections - thank you for sharing. They seem appropriate this week; the "iridescent dust of monarch's wing" caught me.