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12/3/12 Poetry 180 - Bef ore the World Intruded
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Before the World Intruded
Michele Rosenthal
Return me to those infant years,before I woke from sleep,
when ideas were oceans crashing,my dreams blank shores of sand.
Transport me fast to who I waswhen breath was fresh as sight,
my new parts — unfragmented —shielded faith from unkind light.
Draw for me a figure whole, so differentfrom who I am. Show me now
this picture: who I waswhen I began.
Copyright 2003 by Michele Rosenthal.All rights reserved.Reproduced with permission (click for permissions information).
12/3/12 Poetry 180 - End of April
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End of April
Phillis Levin
Under a cherry treeI found a robin’s egg,broken, but not shattered.
I had been thinking of you,and was kneeling in the grassamong fallen blossoms
when I saw it: a blue scrap,a delicate toy, as lightas confetti
It didn’t seem real,but nature will do such thingsfrom time to time.
I looked inside:it was glistening, hollow,a perfect shell
except for the missing crown,which made it possibleto look inside.
What had been thereis gone nowand lives in my heart
where, periodically,it opens up its wings,tearing me apart.
from The Afterimage, 1996Copper Beech Press, Providence, RI
Copyright 1996 by Phillis Levin.All rights reserved.
Reproduced with permission (click for permissions information).
The Library of Congress
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Hate Poem
Julie Sheehan
I hate you truly. Truly I do.Everything about me hates everything about you.The flick of my wrist hates you.The way I hold my pencil hates you.The sound made by my tiniest bones were they trapped in the jaws of a moray eel hates you.Each corpuscle singing in its capillary hates you.
Look out! Fore! I hate you.
The blue-green jewel of sock lint I’m digging from under my third toenail, left foot, hates you.The history of this keychain hates you.My sigh in the background as you explain relational databases hates you.The goldfish of my genius hates you.My aorta hates you. Also my ancestors.
A closed window is both a closed window and an obvious symbol of how I hate you.
My voice curt as a hairshirt: hate.My hesitation when you invite me for a drive: hate.My pleasant “good morning”: hate.You know how when I’m sleepy I nuzzle my head under your arm? Hate.The whites of my target-eyes articulate hate. My wit practices it.My breasts relaxing in their holster from morning to night hate you.Layers of hate, a parfait.Hours after our latest row, brandishing the sharp glee of hate,I dissect you cell by cell, so that I might hate each one individually and at leisure.My lungs, duplicitous twins, expand with the utter validity of my hate, which can never have enough of you,Breathlessly, like two idealists in a broken submarine.
12/3/12 Poetry 180 - Hate Poem
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from PLEIADES, vol. 24:2Central Missouri State Press
Copyright Julie Sheehan.All rights reserved.Reproduced with permission (click for permissions information).
12/3/12 Poetry 180 - In the Well
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A dog fell down a well, and herea boy has to help his father retrieve it.
In the Well
Andrew Hudgins
My father cinched the rope,a noose around my waist,and lowered me intothe darkness. I could taste
my fear. It tasted firstof dark, then earth, then rot.I swung and struck my headand at that moment got
another then: then blood,which spiked my mouth with iron.Hand over hand, my fatherdropped me from then to then:
then water. Then wet fur,which I hugged to my chest.I shouted. Daddy hauledthe wet rope. I gagged, and pressed
my neighbor's missing dogagainst me. I held its deathand rose up to my father.Then light. Then hands. Then breath.
first published in The Southern Review, 2001Volume 37, Number 2, Spring 2001
Copyright 2001 by Andrew Hudgins.All rights reserved.Reproduced with permission (click for permissions information).
12/3/12 Poetry 180 - Ky rie
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Kyrie
Tomas Tranströmer
At times my life suddenly opens its eyes in the dark.A feeling of masses of people pushing blindlythrough the streets, excitedly, toward some miracle,while I remain here and no one sees me.
It is like the child who falls asleep in terrorlistening to the heavy thumps of his heart.For a long, long time till morning puts his light in the locksand the doors of darkness open.
from The Half-Finished Heaven, Swedish translation by Robert Bly, 2001Graywolf Press, St. Paul, Minnesota
Copyright 2001 by Tomas Tranströmer.All rights reserved.Reproduced with permission (click for permissions information).
12/3/12 Poetry 180 - Lesson
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This is a father and son poem.
Lesson
Forrest Hamer
It was 1963 or 4, summer,and my father was driving our familyfrom Ft. Hood to North Carolina in our 56 Buick.We'd been hearing about Klan attacks, and we knew
Mississippi to be more dangerous than usual.Dark lay hanging from the trees the way moss did,and when it moaned light against the windowsthat night, my father pulled off the road to sleep.
Noisesthat usually woke me from rest afraid of monsterskept my father awake that night, too,and I lay in the quiet noticing him listen, learningthat he might not be able always to protect us
from everything and the creatures besides;perhaps not even from the fury suddenly loudthrough my body about his trip from Texasto settle us home before he would go away
to a place no place in the worldhe named Viet Nam. A boy needs a fatherwith him, I kept thinking, fixed against noisefrom the dark.
from Call & Response, 1995Alice James Books, Farmington, Me.
Copyright 1995 by Forrest Hamer.All rights reserved.Reproduced with permission (click for permissions information).
12/3/12 Poetry 180 - Mentor
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In this short poem, a poet regrets not acknowledging a teacher he oncehad. This poem should be read twice.
Mentor
Timothy Murphy
For Robert Francis
Had I known, only knownwhen I lived so near,I'd have gone, gladly goneforegoing my fearof the wholly grownand the nearly great.But I learned alone,so I learned too late.
from The Formalist, A Journal of Metrical Poetry, Volume 12, Issue 1, 2001University of Evansville, Evansville, IN
Copyright 2001 by Timothy Murphy.All rights reserved.Reproduced with permission (click for permissions information).
12/3/12 Poetry 180 - Otherwise
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This is a poem of gratitude about the simple pleasures of life.Jane Kenyon died several years ago of cancer.
Otherwise
Jane Kenyon
I got out of bedon two strong legs.It might have beenotherwise. I atecereal, sweetmilk, ripe, flawlesspeach. It mighthave been otherwise.I took the dog uphillto the birch wood.All morning I didthe work I love.
At noon I lay downwith my mate. It mighthave been otherwise.We ate dinner togetherat a table with silvercandlesticks. It mighthave been otherwise.I slept in a bedin a room with paintingson the walls, andplanned another dayjust like this day.But one day, I know,it will be otherwise.
from Otherwise, 1996Graywolf Press, St. Paul, Minn.
Copyright 1996 by the Estate of Jane Kenyon.All rights reserved.
Reproduced with permission (click for permissions information).
12/3/12 Poetry 180 - The Meadow
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This poet invented a new wordfor her poem: "my withness," meaninga person who is always with you.
The Meadow
Kate Knapp Johnson
Half the day lost, staringat this window. I wanted to knowjust one true thing
about the soul, but I left thinkingfor thought, and now -two inches of snow have fallen
over the meadow. Where did I go,how long was I out lookingfor you?, who would never leave me,my withness, my here.
from Wind Somewhere, and Shade, 2001Miami University Press, Oxford, Ohio
Copyright 2001 by Kate Knapp Johnson.All rights reserved.Reproduced with permission (click for permissions information).
12/3/12 Poetry 180 - Wheels
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Wheels
Jim Daniels
My brother keptin a frame on the wallpictures of every motorcycle, car, truck:in his rusted out Impala convertiblewearing his cap and gownwavingin his yellow Barracudawith a girl leaning into himwavingon his Honda 350wavingon his Honda 750 with the boysholding a beerwavingin his first rigwearing a baseball hat backwardswavingin his Mercury Montegogetting marriedwavingin his black LTDtrying to sell real estatewavingback to driving trucksa shiny new rigwavingon his Harley Sportsterwith his wife on the backwavinghis son in a car seatwith his own steering wheelmy brother leaning over himin an old Ford pickupand they arewavingholding a wrench a raga hose a shammy
waving.
12/3/12 Poetry 180 - Wheels
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waving.
My brother helmetlessrides off on his Harleywavingmy brother's feetrarely touch the ground-waving wavingface pressed to the windno camera to save him.
from Places/Everyone, 1985(University of Wisconsin Press, 1985)
Copyright 1985 by Jim Daniels.All rights reserved.Reproduced with permission (click for permissions information).
