Poems that I love

by Czeslaw Milosz Forget the suffering You caused others. Forget the suffering Others caused you. The waters run and run, Springs sparkle and are done, You walk the earth you are forgetting. Sometimes you hear a distant refrain. What does it mean, you ask, who is singing? A childlike sun grows warm. A grandson and a great-grandson are born. You are led by the hand once again. The names of the rivers remain with you. How endless those rivers seem! Your fields lie fallow, The city towers are not as they were. You stand at the threshold mute. translation by Robert Hass

by Naomi Shihab Nye   After learning my flight was detained 4 hours, I heard the announcement: If anyone in the vicinity of gate 4-A understands any Arabic, Please come to the gate immediately. Well -- one pauses these days. Gate 4-A was my own gate. I went there. An older woman in full traditional Palestinian dress, Just like my grandma wore, was crumpled to the floor, wailing loudly. Help, said the flight service person. Talk to her. What is her Problem? we told her the flight was going to be four hours late and she Did this. I put my arm around her and spoke to her haltingly. Shu dow-a, shu- biduck habibti, stani stani schway, min fadlick, Sho bit se-wee? The minute she heard any words she knew -- however poorly used - She stopped crying. She thought our flight had been cancelled entirely. She needed to be in El Paso for some major medical treatment the Following day. I said no, no, we're fine, you'll get there, just late, Who is picking you up? Let's call

by Robinson Jeffers Two morning stars, Venus and Jupiter, Walk in the pale and liquid light Above the color of these dawns; and as the tide of light Rises higher the great planet vanishes While the nearer still shines. The yellow wave of light In the east and south reddens, the opaque ocean Becomes pale purple: Oh the delicate Earnestness of dawn, the fervor and the pallor. —Stubbornly I think again: The state is a blackmailer, Honest or not, with whom we make (within reason) Our accommodations. There is no valid authority In church or state, custom, scripture nor creed, But only in one’s own conscience and the beauty of things. Doggedly I think again: One’s own conscience is a trick oracle, Worked by parents and nurse-maids, the pressure of people, And the delusions of dead prophets: trust it not. Wash it clean to receive the transhuman beauty: then trust it.

Allen, Phil (standing) and Wm Burroughs Peter and Allen in Paris Peter and Allen, well, au natural With You +1'd this publicly. Undo Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and friends Oh, Allen did love getting naked. I wish I could discipher what is written on his modesty thing-a-ding. Handsome man! At the Triest, on Grant in North Beach. Listening. I guess that he could really listen too. America's poet? I'd vote yeah. Getting naked all around the world!