Nature is bent on new beginning
and death has not a chance of winning...
~Rosy Cole
Kicking off the new year with some unusual praise, prayer, and song today.
Ode to the Hotel Near the Children's Hospital
By Kevin Young
Praise the restless beds
Praise the beds that do not adjust
that won't lift the head to feed
or lower for shots
or blood
or raise to watch the tinny TV
Praise the hotel TV that won't quit
its murmur & holler
read the rest here
******************
Samurai Song
By Robert Pinsky
When I had no roof I made
Audacity my roof. When I had
No supper my eyes dined.
When I had no eyes I listened.
When I had no ears I thought.
When I had no thought I waited.
read the rest here
******************
Small Prayer
By Weldon Kees
Change, move, dead clock, that this fresh day
May break with dazzling light to these sick eyes.
Burn, glare, old sun, so long unseen,
read the rest here
******************
The Miss Rumphius Effect has the Poetry Friday round-up.
16 comments:
Dear Tabatha, thank you for these! I am taken by the fresh perspective of:
"Praise the waiting & then praise the nothing
that's better than bad new"
Thank you, and may 2015 be full of such praises and prayers! xo
The Samurai Song invited several readings, and thank you for it, so filled with the positive isn't it? I enjoyed them all, Tabatha, but this one by Pinsky I will keep. Happy New Year!
A wonderful assortment of New Year's welcomes, Tabatha! I will be making "Praise this mess/that can be left" my mantra for the coming days and hope to awake "with dazzling light".
Happy New Year, Tabatha! I found these poems rather sad, all three, and they leave me counting my many blessings. I hope you enjoy as many this year!
Thanks for sharing these. None are your typical new year's poems.
Very provocative grouping, Tabatha - thanks for stretching my mind and emotions at the cusp of a new year. Wishing you a wonderful 2015!
Young's poem really touched me, Tabatha. I was sick as a child and spent way too much time in hospital beds - this poem really spoke to me.
Unusual, indeed!
That first one shoots straight into my heart. Two friends have had children in hospitals recently, and this poem really speaks to all they went through.
Tabatha, I hope there is no sickness in your life that has inspired this grouping of poems. I wish you health and words of comfort for all of 2015.
Thanks for your concern, Diane! These weren't about me...I wanted to offer them in case they reverberated for someone.
Whew. I thought the same thing Diane did! Samurai Song struck me in the way that the author relentlessly battles what he lacks. It goes perfectly with my OLW for 2015. :-) Thank you!
Your OLW sounds great, Keri! I promise I will come right out and say it if anything is up -- I did in December when I needed to take a week off (As it turns out, Ben had Type A flu! We ended up passing it around the family, but it could have been worse.)
Tabitha, "Beds that won't resurrect
or rise
that lie there like a child should
sleeping, tubeless" leaves me full of hope. The rest of this poem is so difficult to read but makes me appreciate what I often take for granted.
Thanks for sharing these three poems--each one seems to me to have thoughts of healing and hope.
Dear Tabitha,
Appreciations for the introduction to a poet new to me, Kevin Young, originally of Nebraska but now here in the South at Decatur, Ga (We are in North FL, which means we are in Georgia.) I am reading a book on abolition that my hubby gave me at the new year & I see at your link, he's created a poetry collection about the Amistad.
This is a wonderful post - praise, & song & prayer.
I read all of each of them, with joy.
I've always felt that poems are like little prayers to me - you've affirmed that notion with this gorgeous post of unknown-to-me poetry. I like how this year is welcomed by Poetry and shared with all of you through Poetry Friday. Hope you have a blessed 2015 dearest Tabatha!
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