read a good poem, and see a fine picture: todd hido, #6242

todd hido, #6242. via squarecylinder.com

today is "poem in your pocket" day--the academy of american poets is trying to spread the poetic love by offering a little template, with 25 selections that can be printed out for folks to either carry around for themselves, or share. of these, i like lost by sara teasdale...

there is a poem that i carry around, it was sent to me by my aunt several years ago. she knows too well my dreamy, broody side and during a particularly difficult period, i received in the mail a handwritten note from her, on hotel stationery:

be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves.

do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them.

and the point is to live everything.

live the questions now. perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it live along some distant days into the answers.

she came across that passage in "a year by the sea" by joan anderson, which she'd been reading during her vacation. it was written by rainer maria rilke ('letters to a young poet").

i read it from time to time, encouraged by the words, still amazed by the timeliness and thoughtfulness of her sending it. but that is just how she is...

***
i've linked to todd hido's work before--he is a newly discovered favorite photographer of mine, and i really love the shots through a wet, dirty windshield in "a road divided."

here is david m. roth's brief review of his recent show at the stephen wirtz gallery and many more shots from "a road divided" here, via americansuburbx.com.

enjoy.

read a good poem (what was i thinking?)

ever go back and read the dog-eared pages of a favorite book? there are times when i skim these marked pages, and can remember exactly why i did it: how i felt when i read a string of words...who or what i dreamed of when i read it...what secret thought of mine it proclaimed...

but then there are times, like tonight...(was looking for a poem to share and i pulled Sonnets to Orpheus, By Rainer Maria Rilke from my shelf. i'd only marked one page, the one with
sonnet 10:

You, who have never left my feeling,
I greet, antique sarcophagi,
whom the happy waters of Roman days
flow through as a wandering song.

Or those so open, like the eyes
of a happy awakening shepherd,
--full of stillness within and bee-balm--
whence flittered enchanted butterflies;

all those whom one wrests from doubt
I greet, the mouths once again opened
that already knew what silence means.

Do we know it, friends, do we not know it?
These two mold the hesitant hour
in the countenance of man)

and i wonder...wow...what was i thinking?
what was it i liked about this?
was there ever i time i really understood this?
(i must have been a lot smarter--and deeper--years ago...)

i do love the first line:
You, who have never left my feeling...

i also like:
full of stillness within and bee-balm
but as to the meaning? a mystery...

feel free to send me your thoughts.

i'm going to bed, will dream on it...

read a good poem: "the abandoned pie..."

it's not pie, but it's a diner shot...metro diner, nyc.

april is national poetry month!

you can sign up to receive a poem-a-day...and i will post/link to a new poem every day as well...

i'll start things off with a favorite of mine.

it stuns me every time i read it. to me, it's like a hopper painting, or a scene in a noir film...
more than anything, i love the every day, ordinary day intimacy of it...

this is the kind of moment i love to steal and savor.

hope you love it too. feel free to share your thoughts...

"Pie"
by X.J. Kennedy

Whoever dined in this café before us
Took just a forkful of his cherry pie.
We sit with it between us. Let it lie
Until the overworked waitperson comes
To pick it up and brush away the crumbs.

You look at it. I look at it. I stare
At you. You do not look at me at all.
Somewhere, a crash as unwashed dishes fall.
The clatter of a dropped knife splits the air.
Second-hand smoke infiltrates everywhere.

Your fingers clench the handle of a cup
A stranger drained. I almost catch your eye
For a split second. The abandoned pie
Squats on its plate before us, seeping red
Like a thing not yet altogether dead.

find "pie", and more, in the lords of misrule...
brief x.j. kennedy article (from 2006) here...
even more daily poetry via writer's almanac here...