Inspiration: Poems

Maybe it’s all utterly meaningless. Maybe it’s all unutterably meaningful. If you want to know which, pay attention to what it means to be truly human in a world that half the time we’re in love with and half the time scares the hell out of us… The unexpected sound of...

Luxury itself, thick as a Persian carpet, honey fills the jar with the concentrated sweetness of countless thefts, the blossoms bereft, the hive destitute. Though my debts are heavy honey would pay them all. Honey heals, honey mends. A spoon takes more than it can...

I like relativity and quantum theories because I don't understand them and they make me feel as if space shifted about like a swan that can't settle, refusing to sit still and be measured; and as if the atom were an impulsive thing always changing its mind.

When things go wrong as they sometimes will, When the road you're trudging seems all up hill, When the funds are low and the debts are high And you want to smile, but you have to sigh, When care is pressing you down a bit, Rest if you must, but don't you quit. Life is...

Who can grieve for it all? The standard-bearer, seeing his right hand shot off, grabs the flag with his left and shouts God Bless America! as he charges up the hill. An Iraqi child shoos flies from her brother’s corpse. News, they call it. The gospel of atrocities....

The river is famous to the fish. The loud voice is famous to silence, which knew it would inherit the earth before anybody said so. The cat sleeping on the fence is famous to the birds watching him from the birdhouse. The tear is famous, briefly, to the cheek. The...

we will find ourselves surrounded by our kind          all of them now wearing the eyes they had only imagined possible and they will reproach us with those eyes in a language more actual than speech asking why we allowed this to happen...

Today I asked my body what she needed, which is a big deal considering my journey of not really asking that much. I thought she might need more water. or proteins. or greens. or yoga. or supplements. or movement. But as I stood in the shower reflecting on her stretch...

Do not try to save the whole world or do anything grandiose. Instead, create a clearing in the dense forest of your life and wait there patiently, until the song that is your life falls into your own cupped hands and you recognize and greet it. Only then will you know...

When they say Don't I know you? say no. When they invite you to the party remember what parties are like before answering. Someone telling you in a loud voice they once wrote a poem. Greasy sausage balls on a paper plate. Then reply. If they say We should get together...

No one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark. You only run for the border when you see the whole city running as well. Your neighbours running faster than you, the boy you went to school with who kissed you dizzy behind the old tin factory is holding a gun...

i think it’s brave that you get up in the morning even if your soul is weary and your bones ache for a rest i think it’s brave that you keep on living even if you don’t know how to anymore i think it’s brave that you push away the waves rolling in every day and you...

My son barred me from the empathy party his fifth grade classroom hosted. In our evolving dance there are so many events I’m not invited to, moments I’m too intimate to share. Later, he tells me the snacks sucked, crackers and carrot sticks, and there was too much...

If you are not to become a monster, you must care what they think. If you care what they think, how will you not hate them, and so become a monster of the opposite kind? From where then is love to come—love for your enemy that is the way of liberty? From forgiveness....

The likelihood of finding strawberries tiny and wild and sweet around your ankles on any given day in any given place is not great but sometimes people find strawberries right where they are standing just because it is their turn to be given a taste of something wild...

It was a hungry pussy cat, upon Thanksgiving morn, And she watched a thankful little mouse, that ate an ear of corn. "If I ate that thankful little mouse, how thankful he should be, When he had made a meal himself, to make a meal for me! Then with his Thanks for...

I am getting too old for this for peering into a magnifying mirror whose sole mission is to bring into sharp focus each imperfection as though with a little care and attention I can achieve what passes for beauty as if growing old gracefully doesn't include age spots...

She had blue skin, And so did he. He kept it hid And so did she. They searched for blue Their whole life through, Then passed right by- And never knew.

When the rhythm of the heart becomes hectic, Time takes on the strain until it breaks; Then all the unattended stress falls in On the mind like an endless, increasing weight. The light in the mind becomes dim. Things you could take in your stride before Now become...

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks, Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge, Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs And towards our distant rest began to trudge. Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots But limped on, blood-shod....

All the Woulda-Coulda-Shouldas Layin' in the sun, Talkin' 'bout the things They woulda coulda shoulda done... But those Woulda-Coulda-Shouldas All ran away and hid From one little Did.