Poet's Corner

[midcan5]

'Memorial Day for the War Dead'

"Memorial day for the war dead. Add now
the grief of all your losses to their grief,
even of a woman that has left you. Mix
sorrow with sorrow, like time-saving history,
which stacks holiday and sacrifice and mourning
on one day for easy, convenient memory.

Oh, sweet world soaked, like bread,
in sweet milk for the terrible toothless God.
"Behind all this some great happiness is hiding."
No use to weep inside and to scream outside.
Behind all this perhaps some great happiness is hiding.

Memorial day. Bitter salt is dressed up
as a little girl with flowers.
The streets are cordoned off with ropes,
for the marching together of the living and the dead.
Children with a grief not their own march slowly,
like stepping over broken glass.

The flautist's mouth will stay like that for many days.
A dead soldier swims above little heads
with the swimming movements of the dead,
with the ancient error the dead have
about the place of the living water.

A flag loses contact with reality and flies off.
A shopwindow is decorated with
dresses of beautiful women, in blue and white.
And everything in three languages:
Hebrew, Arabic, and Death.

A great and royal animal is dying
all through the night under the jasmine
tree with a constant stare at the world.

A man whose son died in the war walks in the street
like a woman with a dead embryo in her womb.
"Behind all this some great happiness is hiding."

Yehuda Amichai


Disabled American Veterans

 

[SFC Ollie]

In Honor of Memorial Day




In Flanders Fields
By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

 

[midcan5]

'Memorial Day'

"M is for mothers who sent their children off to war
E is for the everlasting gift of freedom
M is for the mums that decorate the graves of the soldiers
O is for the old men that are veterans
[R is for a time of reflection]
I is for the island off Hawaii where the Japanese bombed Pearl harbor
A is for America, the home of the brave
L is for the land of the free."

Anna, 3rd Grader, Academy Elementary School, Madison, Connecticut


Memorial Day History

 

[freedombecki]

Need a place to post this verse, which I memorized in or around the 7th grade but have since have mostly forgotten:

Thomas R. Lounsbury, ed. (1838–1915). Yale Book of American Verse. 1912.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 1807–1882

59. The Village Blacksmith

UNDER a spreading chestnut tree
The village smithy stands;
The smith, a mighty man is he,
With large and sinewy hands;
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands.

His hair is crisp, and black, and long,
His face is like the tan;
His brow is wet with honest sweat,
He earns whate'er he can,
And looks the whole world in the face,
For he owes not any man.

Week in, week out, from morn till night,
You can hear his bellows blow;
You can hear him swing his heavy sledge
With measured beat and slow,
Like a sexton ringing the village bell,
When the evening sun is low.

And children coming home from school
Look in at the open door;
They love to see the flaming forge,
And hear the bellows roar,
And watch the burning sparks that fly
Like chaff from a threshing-floor.

He goes on Sunday to the church,
And sits among his boys;
He hears the parson pray and preach,
He hears his daughter's voice,
Singing in the village choir,
And it makes his heart rejoice.

It sounds to him like her mother's voice,
Singing in Paradise!
He needs must think of her once more,
How in the grave she lies;
And with his hard, rough hand he wipes
A tear out of his eyes.

Toiling,—rejoicing,—sorrowing,
Onward through life he goes;
Each morning sees some task begin,
Each evening sees it close;
Something attempted, something done,
Has earned a night's repose.

Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend,
For the lesson thou hast taught!
Thus at the flaming forge of life
Our fortunes must be wrought;
Thus on its sounding anvil shaped
Each burning deed and thought!​

 

[midcan5]

'Man of the Year'

"My father tells the story of his life

and he repeats The most important thing:
to love your work.
I always loved my work. I was a lucky man.

This man who makes up half of who I am,
this blusterer
who tricked the rich, outsmarting smarter men,

gave up his Army life insurance plan
(not thinking of the future
wife and kids) and brokered deals with two-faced

rats who disappeared his cash but later overpaid
for building sites.
In every tale my father plays outlaw, a Robin Hood

for whom I'm named, a type of yeoman
refused admission
into certain clubs. For years he joined no guild—

no Drapers, Goldsmiths, Skinners, Merchant
Tailors, Salters, Vintners—
but lived on prescience and cleverness.

He was the self-inventing Polish immigrant's
Son, transformed
By American tools into Errol Flynn.

As he speaks, I remember the phone calls
during meals—
an old woman dead in apartment two-twelve

or burst pipes and water flooding rooms.
Hatless,
he left the house and my mother's face

assumed the permanent worry she wore,
forced to watch him
gamble the future of the semi-detached house,

our college funds, and his weekly payroll.
Manorial halls
of Philadelphia his Nottingham,

my father fashioned his fraternity
without patronage
or royal charters but a mercantile

swagger, finding his Little John, Tinker,
and Allen-a-Dale.
Wholesalers, retailers, in time they resembled

the men they set themselves against.
Each year they roast and toast
one member, a remnant of the Grocer's Feast

held on St. Anthony's Day, when brothers
communed and dined
on swan, capon, partridges, and wine.

They commission a coat of arms, a song,
and honor my father—
exemplary, self-made, without debt—

as Man of the Year, a title he reveres
for the distinguished
peerage he joins, the lineage of merry men."

Robin Becker

 

[midcan5]

'Silent Manners'

"Before you invest in a book on manners,
Better make sure it contains a chapter
On keeping silent, one to remind you,
When you pull off on the shoulder
Of a country road to ask directions,
Not to ask the elderly man in overalls,
Who crosses the field to greet you,
Why he isn't wearing a hat on a day so sunny.
If the sun has deepened the ruts in his face,
It's too late now to stop it, the chapter reasons,
And why remind him how much he's aged?

And if you notice blood-vessel cobwebs
Beneath his eyes—for you a sure sign of drinking
Over many years—the same chapter will warn you
Not to suggest, however gently, that help
Is available if he wants to stop. Who knows
What escape you might have tried
If you'd had his worries:
The flooding and drought and heavy mortgage,
The doctor's bills he'll never see the end of.

Already you owe him something for the reticence
That keeps him from asking, when you tell him
You're on your way to visit an old friend,
Why you've come so seldom you can't recall
If you're anywhere near the turnoff.
"You can't miss it," he simply says,
"Three miles straight ahead at the stand of sweet gum,"
And when your doubtful look suggests
You can't tell a sweet-gum tree from a hemlock,
He fishes a pencil out of his bib pocket
And sketches its shape so deftly
You're certain you'd know it anywhere,

So deftly you'll need to resist the urge to ask
If he ever considered a career in art.
If he didn't, it's too late now to begin. If he did,
But then decided against it, why finger that wound?
Keep silent and show how grateful you are
For his not asking what work you do
That's so important it's justified letting a friendship
Thin to a shadow of what it was.

Then it's time to thank him and drive off,
Glad you haven't asked him about the beautiful
Sunrises and sunsets he must be able to witness
Above the hills to the east and west.
It's best to avoid a compliment that might remind him
Of the difference between watching a sunset
With the friends who used to watch beside him
And watching now."

Carl Dennis

 

[midcan5]

'Searchers'

"At dawn Warren is on my bed,
a ragged lump of fur listening
to the birds as if deciding whether or not
to catch one. He has an old man’s
mimsy delusion. A rabbit runs across
the yard and he walks after it
thinking he might close the widening distance
just as when I followed a lovely woman
on boulevard Montparnasse but couldn’t equal
her rapid pace, the click-click of her shoes
moving into the distance, turning the final
corner, but when I turned the corner
she had disappeared and I looked up
into the trees thinking she might have climbed one.
When I was young a country girl would climb
a tree and throw apples down at my upturned face.
Warren and I are both searchers. He’s looking
for his dead sister Shirley, and I’m wondering
about my brother John who left the earth
on this voyage all living creatures take.
Both cat and man are bathed in pleasant
insignificance, their eyes fixed on birds and stars."

Jim Harrison

 

[midcan5]

'Sorting It Out'

"At the table she used to sew at,
he uses his brass desk scissors
to cut up his shirt.
Not that the shirt
was that far gone: one ragged cuff,
one elbow through;
but here he is,
cutting away the collar
she long since turned.
What gets to him finally,
using his scissors like a bright claw,
is prying buttons off:
after they’ve leapt,
spinning the floor, he bends
to retrieve both sizes:
he intends to
save them in some small box; he knows
he has reason to save; if only he knew
where a small box
used to be kept."

Philip Booth

 

[midcan5]

'What I Believe'

"I believe there is no justice,
but that cottongrass and bunchberry
grow on the mountain.

I believe that a scorpion’s sting
will kill a man,
but that his wife will remarry.

I believe that, the older we get,
the weaker the body,
but the stronger the soul.

I believe that if you roll over at night
in an empty bed,
the air consoles you.

I believe that no one is spared
the darkness,
and no one gets all of it.

I believe we all drown eventually
in a sea of our making,
but that the land belongs to someone else.

I believe in destiny.
And I believe in free will.

I believe that, when all
the clocks break,
time goes on without them.

And I believe that whatever
pulls us under,
will do so gently.

so as not to disturb anyone,
so as not to interfere
with what we believe in."

Michael Blumenthal

 

[midcan5]

'Fat Is Not a Fairy Tale'

"I am thinking of a fairy tale,
Cinder Elephant,
Sleeping Tubby,
Snow Weight,
where the princess is not
anorexic, wasp-waisted,
flinging herself down the stairs.

I am thinking of a fairy tale,
Hansel and Great,
Repoundsel,
Bounty and the Beast,
where the beauty
has a pillowed breast,
and fingers plump as sausage.

I am thinking of a fairy tale
that is not yet written,
for a teller not yet born,
for a listener not yet conceived,
for a world not yet won,
where everything round is good:
the sun, wheels, cookies, and the princess."

Jane Yolen

 

[midcan5]

'Lay Back the Darkness'

"My father in the night shuffling from room to room
on an obscure mission through the hallway.

Help me, spirits, to penetrate his dream
and ease his restless passage.

Lay back the darkness for a salesman
who could charm everything but the shadows,

an immigrant who stands on the threshold
of a vast night

without his walker or his cane
and cannot remember what he meant to say,

though his right arm is raised, as if in prophecy,
while his left shakes uselessly in warning.

My father in the night shuffling from room to room
is no longer a father or a husband or a son,

but a boy standing on the edge of a forest
listening to the distant cry of wolves,

to wild dogs,
to primitive wingbeats shuddering in the treetops."

Edward Hirsch

 

[midcan5]

'My Papa’s Waltz'

"The whiskey on your breath
Could make a small boy dizzy;
But I hung on like death:
Such waltzing was not easy.

We romped until the pans
Slid from the kitchen shelf;
My mother’s countenance
Could not unfrown itself.

The hand that held my wrist
Was battered on one knuckle;
At every step you missed
My right ear scraped a buckle.

You beat time on my head
With a palm caked hard by dirt,
Then waltzed me off to bed
Still clinging to your shirt."

Theodore Roethke

 

[midcan5]

"Deep summer is when laziness finds respectability." Sam Keen

'Uniforms'

"It is very hot—92 today—to be wearing
a stocking cap, but the adolescent swaggering
through the grocery store automatic door
doesn’t seem to mind; does not even appear
to be perspiring. The tugged-down hat
is part of his carefully orchestrated outfit:
bagging pants, screaming t-shirt, high-topped
shoes. The young woman who yells to her friends
from an open pickup window is attired
for summer season in strapless stretch
tube top, slipping down toward bountiful
cleavage valley. She tugs it up in front
as she races toward the two who have
just passed a cigarette between them
like a baton on a relay team. Her white
chest gleams like burnished treasure
as they giggle loudly there in the corner
and I glance down to see what costume
I have selected to present myself to
the world today. I smile; it’s my sky blue
shirt with large deliberately faded Peace sign,
smack dab in the middle, plus grey suede
Birkenstocks—a message that “I lived through
the sixties and am so proud.” None of the
young look my way. I round the corner and
walk into Evening descending."

Barbara Schmitz

 

[midcan5]

'Sick'

"‘I cannot go to school today, ‘
Said little Peggy Ann McKay.
‘I have the measles and the mumps,
A gash, a rash and purple bumps.
My mouth is wet, my throat is dry,
I’m going blind in my right eye.
My tonsils are as big as rocks,
I’ve counted sixteen chicken pox
And there’s one more-that’s seventeen,
And don’t you think my face looks green?
My leg is cut-my eyes are blue-
It might be instamatic flu.
I cough and sneeze and gasp and choke,
I’m sure that my left leg is broke-
My hip hurts when I move my chin,
My belly button’s caving in,
My back is wrenched, my ankle’s sprained,
My ‘pendix pains each time it rains.
My nose is cold, my toes are numb.
I have a sliver in my thumb.
My neck is stiff, my voice is weak,
I hardly whisper when I speak.
My tongue is filling up my mouth,
I think my hair is falling out.
My elbow’s bent, my spine ain’t straight,
My temperature is one-o-eight.
My brain is shrunk, I cannot hear,
There is a hole inside my ear.
I have a hangnail, and my heart is-what?
What’s that? What’s that you say?
You say today is…Saturday?
G’bye, I’m going out to play!' "

Shel Silverstein

 

[midcan5]

'Beautiful Old Age'

"It ought to be lovely to be old
to be full of the peace that comes of experience
and wrinkled ripe fulfillment.

The wrinkled smile of completeness that follows a life
lived undaunted and unsoured with accepted lies
they would ripen like apples, and be scented like pippins
in their old age.

Soothing, old people should be, like apples
when one is tired of love.
Fragrant like yellowing leaves, and dim with the soft
stillness and satisfaction of autumn.

And a girl should say:
It must be wonderful to live and grow old.
Look at my mother, how rich and still she is! -

And a young man should think: By Jove
my father has faced all weathers, but it’s been a life!"

David Herbert Lawrence

 

[midcan5]

'Pity the Beautiful'

"Pity the beautiful,
the dolls, and the dishes,
the babes with big daddies
granting their wishes.
Pity the pretty boys,
the hunks, and Apollos,
the golden lads whom
success always follows.
The hotties, the knock-outs,
the tens out of ten,
the drop-dead gorgeous,
the great leading men.
Pity the faded,
the bloated, the blowsy,
the paunchy Adonis
whose luck’s gone lousy.
Pity the gods,
no longer divine.
Pity the night
the stars lose their shine."

Dana Gioia

 

[midcan5]

Who Cares

Have you ever been asked what you do
and thought how should I answer
I tell my wife to ignore me
when I am something other than I am
I tell my interlocutor
I am something other
I want to say something without parameters
I am a mundane question
looking for work
I am Sisyphus same hill
drudgery defines it
what would they say I wonder
in life I have ceased to care about image
I am unsure why
It just seems meaningless
on this grain of sand
a universe of billions of years
the tragedy of life often cut short
of needless suffering
gives me pause and wonder
the mind is formed
by the very universe that holds all things
the mind is formed by life
something has made me
not care.

 

[midcan5]

'My Father Remembers Blue Zebras'

"He remembers that he lost his wallet

he knows about the rainshadow
and the string of islands off the coast of Vancouver

oboeru to remember
also means to learn

I try to keep track of what he put where
the small green car we called Cricket
the second time he got drafted
and Aunt Nina’s husband, he's a nice guy but he’s a fascist

he's asking me again
where do you live
oh, you're in school, what do you study

how far off coast do you have to go
to be sheltered from the rain

that's wonderful Dad says, that's wonderful."

Judy Halebsky

 

[SFC Ollie]

Received in Email today:

Unknown Author....


I watched the flag pass by one day.
It fluttered in the breeze.




A young Marine saluted it,
And then he stood at ease.


I looked at him in uniform;
so young, so tall, so proud.
With hair cut square and eyes alert,
he'd stand out in any crowd.


I thought how many men like him
had fallen through the years.
How many died on foreign soil;
how many mothers' tears?


How many pilots' planes shot down?
How many died at sea?
How many foxholes were soldiers' graves?
NO, FREEDOM ISN'T FREE !


I heard the sound of Taps one night,
when everything was still.
I listened to the bugler play
And felt a sudden chill.

I wondered just how many times
That Taps had meant 'Amen.'
When a flag had draped a coffin
of a brother or a friend.



I thought of all the children,
of the mothers and the wives,
of fathers, sons and husbands
With interrupted lives.




I thought about a graveyard
At the bottom of the sea.
Of unmarked graves in Arlington .
NO FREEDOM ISN'T FREE

 

[midcan5]

'APO 96225'

"A young man once went off to war in a far country,
and when he had time, he wrote home and said,
"Dear Mom, sure rains a lot here."

But his mother — reading between the lines as mothers
always do — wrote back,
"We’re quite concerned. Tell us what it’s really like."

And the young man responded,
"Wow! You ought to see the funny monkeys."

To which the mother replied,
"Don’t hold back. How is it there?"

And the young man wrote,
"The sunsets here are spectacular!"

In her next letter, the mother pleaded,
"Son, we want you to tell us everything. Everything!"

So the next time he wrote, the young man said,
"Today I killed a man. Yesterday, I helped drop napalm
on women and children."

And the father wrote right back,
"Please don’t write such depressing letters. You’re
upsetting your mother."

So, after a while,
the young man wrote,
"Dear Mom, sure rains here a lot."

Larry Rottmann