I have spent much of my life looking at plants. And recently it seems that plants, with sympathy, are looking at me. I wish I could get them to look the other way. It has all to do with the memories, memories of the time when southern California was different, or the world was different, and so was I.
~ Hildegarde Flanner
by Wislawa Szymborska
When I pronounce the word Future,
the first syllable already belongs to the past.
When I pronounce the word Silence,
I destroy it.
When I pronounce the word Nothing,
I make something no nonbeing can hold.
I saw a woman sleeping. In her
sleep she dreamt Life stood
before her, and held in each
hand a gift – in the one Love,
in the other Freedom. And she
said to the woman, ‘Choose!’
And the woman waited long:
and she said, ‘Freedom!’
And Life said, ‘Thou hast
well chosen. If though hadst said,
“Love,” I would have given
thee that thou didst ask for;
and I would have gone from
thee, and returned to thee no
more. Now, the day will come
when I shall return. In that
day I shall bear both gifts in
one hand.’
I heard the woman laugh in
her sleep.
And love is the manger
And love is the star
And love is the fusion
Be it near or afar.
And love is the promise
In constancy given.
And love is the palette
That bursts from the prism.
And love is the seed
And love is the birth
And love is the fruit
From the root of dry earth.
And love is the gift
Beyond price and yet free.
And love is the candle
And love is the tree.
And love is the question
And love the reply.
The gift born in Heaven
That never can die.
And love never changes
In three, yet the whole.
And love is the vision
Of mind, heart and soul.
And love is the leper
And love is the Lord
And love is the action
Made flesh by the word.
And love is the rose
And love is the thorn
And love is the nail
And love is the crown.
And love is the alpha
The beginning and end.
And there in the midst
God chose me – a friend.
Pamela Mercy Leaf
How we dwelt in two worlds
the daughters and the mothers
in the kingdom of the sons.
Adrienne Rich
The Secret
Two girls discover
the secret of life
in a sudden line of
poetry.
I who don’t know the
secret wrote
the line. They
told me
(through a third person)
they had found it
but not what it was
not even
what line it was. No doubt
by now, more than a week
later, they have forgotten
the secret,
the line, the name of
the poem. I love them
for finding what
I can’t find,
and for loving me
for the line I wrote,
and for forgetting it
so that
a thousand times, till death
finds them, they may
discover it again, in other
lines
in other
happenings. And for
wanting to know it,
for
assuming there is
such a secret, yes,
for that
most of all.
I am convinced that courage is the most important of all the virtues. Because without courage, you cannot practice any other virtue consistently. You can be kind for a while; you can be generous for a while; you can be just for a while, or merciful for a while, even loving for a while. But it is only with courage that you can be persistently and insistently kind and generous and fair.
Crown
by Kay Ryan
Too much rain
loosens trees.
In the hills giant oaks
fall upon their knees.
You can touch parts
you have no right to—
places only birds
should fly to.
‘because
you rubbed
my shoulder
last night
a poem
traveled down
my arm’
~ alice walker
Panama Poets 