Found

My wife waits for a caterpillar

to crawl upon her palm so she

can carry it out of the street

and into the green subdivision

of a tree.

Yesterday she coaxed a spider

into a juicier corner. The day

before she hazed a snail

in a half-circle, so he wouldn't

have to crawl all the way

around the world and be 2,000

years late for dinner.

I want her to hurry up and pay

attention to me or go where I

want to go until I remember

the night she found me wet

and limping, felt for a collar

and tags, then put me in

the truck where it was warm.

Without her, I wouldn't

be standing here in these

snazzy alligator shoes.

Ron Koertge, Iodine Poetry Journal (no other information found)

Your Part

My church is conducting worship online these days.
I sing a lot of our music live;
we also pre-record some pieces
one voice at a time and mix them into an ensemble piece.
I record a guitar track. Then a vocal track or two or three.
Then I send them off to James and he adds Jenny's voice
and mixes them into a beautiful song.
I never get to hear the whole song, just my part,
till the mix is done.

Love is like that.
God is singing in us.
You don't hear the whole song.
You just listen to God's love
and sing your part,
and trust the whole
is more beautiful than you can know.
That is all.

That is enough.

Steve Garnass-Holmes, unfoldinglight.net, June 4, 2020

DHARMA

The way the dog trots out the front door
every morning
without a hat or an umbrella,
without any money
or the keys to her dog house
never fails to fill the saucer of my heart
with milky admiration.

Who provides a finer example
of a life without encumbrance?
Thoreau in his curtainless hut
with a single plate, a single spoon?
Gandhi with his staff and holy diapers?

Off she goes into the material world
with nothing but her brown coat
and her modest blue collar,
following only her wet nose,
the twin portals of her steady breathing,
followed only by the plume of her tail.

If only she did not shove the cat aside
every morning
and eat all his food
what a model of self-containment she would be,
what a paragon of earthly detachment.
If only she were not so eager
for a rub behind the ears,
so acrobatic in her welcomes,
if only I were not her god.

Billy Collins, Poetry August, 1998

In a Cafe

When Love is lost, the laughter's good and gone,

The sun sinks down, the heavy fog rolls in,

Nothing is left to say and you know that no good

Will ever come of this,

Life will never again be miraculous.

Tall dark woman in the cafe, I see

How the tears glitter in your blue eyes.

You drink black coffee for bravery

And weep onto the front page of the Times.

I had a love once too who now is gone, is

gone, she's gone. The waves roll along

The coast. The sweet summer rain blows in.

If I knew you, I'd sit by your side and sing:

This world is not our home, we're only passing through.

Gary Johnson, 'The Writer's Almanac,' April 4, 2020

No Longer a Teenager

my daughter, who turns twenty tomorrow,
has become truly independent.
she doesn't need her father to help her
deal with the bureaucracies of schools,
hmo's, insurance, the dmv.
she is quite capable of handling
landlords, bosses, and auto repair shops.
also boyfriends and roommates.
and her mother.

frankly it's been a big relief.
the teenage years were often stressful.
sometimes, though, i feel a little useless.

but when she drove down from northern California
to visit us for a couple of days,
she came through the door with the
biggest, warmest hug in the world for me.
and when we all went out for lunch,
she said, affecting a little girl's voice,
"i'm going to sit next to my daddy,"
and she did, and slid over close to me
so i could put my arm around her shoulder
until the food arrived.

i've been keeping busy since she'e gone,
mainly with my teaching and writing,
a little travel connected to both,
but i realized how long it had been
since i had felt deep emotion.

when she left i said simply,
"i love you,"
and she replied quietly,
"i love you too."
you know it isn't always easy for
a twenty-year-old to say that;
it isn't always easy for a father.

literature and opera are full of
characters who die for love:
i stay alive for her.

Gerald Locklin, The Life Force Poems (Water Row Books, 2002)

Father

May 19, 1999

Today you would be ninety-seven
if you had lived, and we would all be
miserable, you and your children,
driving from clinic to clinic,
an ancient, cheerful hypochondriac
and his fretful son and daughter,
asking directions, trying to read
the complicated, fading maps of cures.
But with your dignity intact
you have been gone for twenty years,
and I am glad for all of us, although
I miss you every day -- the heartbeat
under your necktie, the hand cupped
on the back of my neck, Old Spice
in the air, your voice delighted with stories.
On this day each year you loved to relate
that at the moment of your birth
your mother glanced out the window
and saw lilacs in bloom. Well, today
lilacs are blooming in side yards
all over Iowa, still welcoming you.

Ted Kooser, Delights & Shadows (Copper Canyon Press, 2004)

For a Time of Sorrow

I share with you the agony of your grief,
    The anguish of your heart finds echo in my own.
    I know I cannot enter all you feel,
    Nor bear with you the burden of your pain;
I can but offer what my love does give:
    The strength of caring,
    The warmth of one who seeks to understand
    The silent storm-swept barrenness of so great a loss.
This I do in quiet ways,
    That on your lonely path
    You may not walk alone.

Howard Thurman, Meditations of the Heart (Beacon Press, 1999)

Pray

How do you live through a siege?
How do you guard your heart and keep your hope
amid violence, hatred, injustice and fear?
You pray.

Sit still.
Let the sounds of the news
and the voices in your head settle and fade.
Release your fears and desires. Offer them to God.

Sit with the God of love and mercy.
Just sit with God. Sit, and listen.

Listen to God's passion for life and wholeness,
for justice and healing.

What do you hear from God,
the God who says "Let there be light,"
who says "I give my life for you,"
who enters the world's suffering?
What is God saying to you?

It may be silence.
God may be weeping. God may be praying,
radiating blessing for all who are broken,
working wonders, renewing life you cannot see or know.

Open your heart
to let that light and mercy flood in,
to trust that gracious will.

Breathe deeply of that peace,
willing to be light in the darkness . . .
and go with love and courage
into the day.

Steve Garnass-Holmes, unfoldinglight.net, June 2, 2020

Call-Back

With her purse on his lap,
he waits in the lobby.
The fake leather chair
does not fit his back.

Every pair of eyes
scans a small screen;
each pair of thumbs
does the Quickstep.

Forcing his glance away
from the clock on the wall,
he squints at the squares
of his unsolved Sudoku.

Then she strides out,
fingers spread in a V.
A waiting patient smiles,
offers silent congratulations.

May you be just as lucky, she says,
touching the woman's shoulder.
They've never met before
and won't see each other again.

Her husband hands over her purse.
They link arms and leave, picking up
their life where they left it
when she received the call-back.

Johanna DeMay, yourdailypoem.com, June 7, 2020

Packing

We celebrated our fortieth anniversary
not with a party or a romantic date,
but by packing, preparing to move.

From what's accumulated we choose what stays or goes;
the staying of love we chose long ago
we choose again and again, always choosing:

the constant, the container, the compass,
the warp. The melody, no matter the key,
the tempo or time signature or thousand harmonies.

Abandon the things. Set them out at the curb.
Cling only to presence, being there for each other:
it's the serenity that lasts, underneath the noise.

Things break. Places change. Hearts grow.
Presence persists, adapts, abides.
When we leave the house, the house we come to.

The this and the that come and go.
The where and the what change and flow.
The we remains. And, so, the gratitude.

Steve Garnass-Holmes, unfoldinglight.net, June 9, 2020

I Dream a World

I dream a world where man

No other man will scorn,

Where love will bless the earth

And peace its paths adorn. 

I dream a world where all

Will know sweet freedom's way,

Where greed no longer saps the soul

Nor avarice blights our day.

A world I dream where black or white,

Whatever race you be,

Will share the bounties of the earth

And every man is free,

Where wretchedness will hang its head

And joy, like a pearl,

Attends the needs of all mankind -- 

Of such I dream, my world!

Langston Hughes, The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes, ed. Arnold Rampersand (Alfred A. Knopf, 1994) 

Justice Cry

The cry for justice
is not desperate,
not fragile.
It comes
from the center
of the earth,
like gravity,
the hunger of all life
for each other,
for belonging,
for the alchemy
of becoming whole
by becoming one.
Our Great Men
are mostly deaf to it.
The smaller you are
the greater its power
in you.
It does not cease
but makes you ache
(evil the desperate avoidance
of the haunting ache)
until you answer.
Answer, then,
and fall into that gravity,
into that grave.
Empty yourself
of all power.
Yes, die.
Into that cavity rushes
the infinite power of God --
and you are raised,
one now with the pressed,
the shunned, the used.
This power
will sustain you
through this death
and the next and beyond.
Resist evil, injustice, and oppression
and evil will fight back.
But never mind your deaths.
Stay risen.
Even crucified
do justice,
trust God,
and stay risen.

Steve Garnass-Holmes, unfoldinglight.net, January 20, 2020

A Small Needful Fact

Is that Eric Garner worked
for some time for the Parks and Rec.
Horticultural Department, which means,
perhaps, that with his very large hands,
perhaps, in all likelihood,
he put gently into the earth
some plants which, most likely,
some of them, in all likelihood,
continue to grow, continue
to do what such plants do, like house
and feed small and necessary creatures,
like being pleasant to touch and smell,
like converting sunlight
into food, like making it easier
for us to breathe.

Ross Gay, splitthisrock.org/poetry-database, 2015

Leaning In

Sometimes, in the middle of a crowded store on a Saturday
afternoon, my husband will rest his hand
on my neck, or on the soft flesh belted at my waist,
and pull me to him. I understand

his question: Why are we so fortunate
when all around us, friends are falling prey
to divorce and illness? It seems intemperate
to celebrate in a more conspicuous way

so we just stand there, leaning in
to one another, until that moment
of sheer blessedness dissolves and our skin,
which has been touching, cools and relents,

settling back into our separate skeletons
as we head to Housewares to resume our errands.

Sue Ellen Thompson, The Golden Hour (Autumn House Press, 2006)

Center Cafe

Well, you're in town, then. The boys
from the class reunion wander in
and take their places in the corner booth,
just as they might have fifty years ago --
grayer, balding, wearing hats announcing
places far away. Their conversation
rises, falls to the inevitable -- a missing
friend who worked right up until the end,
another who is long past traveling. Smiles
grow distant as their silence overtakes
the room. The busy waitress pauses,
nods. She's always known the boys.

Mark Vinz, Local News: Poetry about Small Towns (MWPH Books, 2019)

Aunt Lucy and Mother Surprise Me with a Visit

I dash frantic room to room
spread a bed, pick up toys,
kick dog bones into corners.
Before I can change my rumpled shirt
or brush my hair,
the dervishes rush the door.
Mother straightens every painting
in her path. Aunt Lucy arranges
knick-knacks on the mantle.
Mother suggests I fold laundry
as I go. Lucy says to try
some Mop and Glo. They'd
love to put my house in order
if they just had time to loiter.
Outside, the dogs drag trash across
the lawn. Of course, they see this
through my smudgy kitchen window.
I plop a can of tuna in a bowl,
whack celery, onion, pickle
to a furious fine mince, finish
with a squirt of mustard,
glop of mayo, rip open a bag
of chips and call it lunch.
They eat. They split a Coke.
Then, out they whirl
as quickly as they came.
On the porch, kisses, quick goodbyes.
Then Mother rubs her thumb
hard down my spine,
her wordless gesture says it all:
straighten up, young lady; its past time.

Donna Hilbert, Gravity: New and Selected Poems (Tebot Bach, 2018)