Blessing the Dust

All those days
you felt like dust,
like dirt,
as if all you had to do
was turn your face
toward the wind
and be scattered
to the four corners

or swept away
by the smallest breath
as insubstantial --

did you not know
what the Holy One
can do with dust?

This is the day
we freely say
we are scorched.

This is the hour
we are marked
by what has made it
through the burning.

This is the moment
we ask for the blessing
that lives within
the ancient ashes,
that makes its home
inside the soil of
this sacred earth.

So let us be marked
not for sorrow.
And let us be marked
not for shame.
Let us be marked
not for false humility
or for thinking
we are less
than we are

but for claiming
what God can do
within the dust,
within the dirt,
within the stuff
of which the world
is made
and the stars that blaze
in our bones
and the galaxies that spiral
inside the smudge
we bear.

Jan Richardson, paintedprayerbook.com, February 8, 2013

I Cannot Sing

I cannot sing, because when a child,
My mother often hushed me.
The others she allowed to sing
No matter what their melody.

And since I've grown to manhood
All music I applaud,
But have no voice for singing,
So I write my songs to God.

I have ears and know the measures,
And I'll write a song for you,
But the world must do the singing
Of my sonnets old and new.

Now tell me, world of music,
Why I cannot sing one song?
Is it because my mother hushed me
And laughed when I was wrong.

Although I can write music,
And tell when harmony's right,
I will never sing better than when
My song was hushed one night.

Fond mothers, always be careful;
Let the songs be poorly sung.
To hush the child is cruel;
Let it sing while it is young.

Edward Nathaniel Harleston, public domain, published in Poem-a-Day, January 26, 2020, by the Academy of American Poets

Practicing Basketball in Farm Country

Dribbling around a wagon or a chair
was as good as having an opponent
except for the reach, but a broom
placed with wide end out could prove
an arm or hand meant to steal a ball.

I learned to dribble on the grass, on the gravel
of a grist mill with a hoop posted flat
against the board and batten, kept
a spare ball inside in warmth in winter
to trade for the first ball deflated by the cold.

My father told me to always work
on my passing, hitting the chalked-up silhouette
of a player on the side of the mill,
that I could assist many more times
in life than I would score.

Jeff Burt, yourdailypoem.com, January 21, 2020

Where's That Thing?

Where's that thing?
you ask me
looking in the cabinet above the stove.
The new one or old one, I reply,
fairly sure you know what I mean.
Old one.
It's under the sink.
It's not there.
Just look.
I'm looking.
Look under that stuff.
It's not here.
The other stuff.
Nope.
Wait. You mean the green one?
No. Blue. I think it's blue.
Oh. That's in the drawer.
I checked the drawer.
Did you look behind the plastic thing?
We're talking about the same thing right, the one
    with the weird top?
Of course.
Wait. Here it is.

John Kenney, Love Poems (for People with Children) (G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2019)

Ode to the Boy Who Jumped Me

You and your friend stood
on the corner of the liquor store
as I left Champa Garden,

takeout in hand, on the phone
with Ashley who said,
That was your tough voice.

I never heard your tough voice before.
I gave you boys a quick nod,
walked E 21st past dark houses.

Before I could reach the lights
on Park, you criss-crossed
your hands around me,

like a friend and I'd hoped
that you were Seng,
the boy I kissed on First Friday

in Octeber. He paid for my lunch
at that restaurant, split the leftovers.
But that was a long time ago

and we hadn't spoken since,
so I dropped to my knees
to loosen myself from your grip,

my back to the ground, I kicked
and screamed but nobody
in the neighborhood heard me,

only Ashley on the other line,
in Birmingham, where they say,
How are you? to strangers

not what I said in my tough voice
but what I last texted Seng,
no response. You didn't get on top,

you hovered. My elbows banged
the sidewalk. I threw
the takeout at you and saw

your face. Young. More scared
of me than I was of you.
Hands on my ankles, I thought

you'd take me or rape me.
Instead you acted like a man
who slipped out of my bed

and promised to call:
You said nothing.
Not even what you wanted.

Monica Sok, original publicstion in Poem-of-the-Day, February 20, 2020

Some Keep the Sabbath Going to the Church

Some keep the Sabbath going to the Church --
I keep it, staying at Home --
With a Bobolink for a Chorister --
And an Orchard, for a Dome --

Some keep the Sabbath in Surplice --
I just wear my Wings --
And instead of tolling the Bell, for Church,
Our little Sexton -- sings.

God preaches, a noted Clergyman --
And the sermon is never long,
So instead of getting to heaven, at last --
I'm going, all along.

Emily Dickinson

Personal

Don't take it personal, they said:
but I did, I took it all quite personal --
the breeze and the river and the color of the fields;
the price of grapefruit and stamps,

the wet hair of women in the rain --
and I cursed what hurt me

and I praised what gave me joy,
the most simple-minded of possible responses.

The government reminded me of my father,
with its deafness and its laws,

and the weather reminded me of my mom,
with her tropical squalls.

Enjoy it while you can, they said of Happiness
Think first, they said of Talk

Get over it, they said
at the school of Broken Hearts

But I couldn't and I didn't and I don't
believe in the clean break;

I believe in the compound fracture
served with a sauce of dirty regret,

I believe in saying it all
and taking it all back

and saying it again
while the air fills up with I'm-Sorries

like wheeling birds
and the trees look seasick in the wind.

Oh life! Can you blame me
for making a scene?

You were that yellow caboose, the moon
disappearing over a ridge of cloud.

I was the dog, chained in some fool's backyard;
barking and barking:

trying to convince everything else
to take it personal too.

Tony Hoagland, Poetry, July/August, 2009