Tuesday Poetry Blogging
Two poems this week; one for John and one for Lyndsay.
A Secret Life
Stephen Dunn
Why you need to have one
is not much more mysterious than
why you don't say what you think
at the birth of an ugly baby.
Or, you've just made love
and feel you'd rather have been
in a dark booth where your partner
was nodding, whispering yes, yes,
you're brilliant. The secret life
begins early, is kept alive
by all that's unpopular
in you, all that you know
a Baptist, say, or some other
accountant would object to.
It becomes what you'd most protect
if the government said you can protect
one thing, all else is ours.
When you write late at night
it's like a small fire
in a clearing, it's what
radiates and what can hurt
if you get too close to it.
It's why your silence is a kind of truth.
Even when you speak to your best friend,
the one who'll never betray you,
you always leave out one thing;
a secret life is that important.
Ave Atque Vale
Billy Collins
Even though I managed to swerve around the lump
of groundhog lying on its back on the road,
he traveled with me for miles,
a quiet passenger
who passed the time looking out the window
enjoying this new view of the woods
he once hobbled around in,
sleeping all day and foraging at night,
rising sometimes to consult the wind with his snout.
Last night he must have wandered
onto the road, hoping to slip
behind the curtain of soft ferns on the other side.
I see these forms every day
and always hope the next one up ahead
is a shredded tire, a discarded brown coat,
but there they are, assuming
every imaginable pose for death's portrait.
This one I speak of, for example,
the one who rode with me for miles,
reminded me of a small Roman citizen,
with his prosperous belly,
his faint smile,
and his one stiff forearm raised
as if he were still alive, still hailing Caesar.
That's all, folks. Be well, do good works, keep in touch.
A Secret Life
Stephen Dunn
Why you need to have one
is not much more mysterious than
why you don't say what you think
at the birth of an ugly baby.
Or, you've just made love
and feel you'd rather have been
in a dark booth where your partner
was nodding, whispering yes, yes,
you're brilliant. The secret life
begins early, is kept alive
by all that's unpopular
in you, all that you know
a Baptist, say, or some other
accountant would object to.
It becomes what you'd most protect
if the government said you can protect
one thing, all else is ours.
When you write late at night
it's like a small fire
in a clearing, it's what
radiates and what can hurt
if you get too close to it.
It's why your silence is a kind of truth.
Even when you speak to your best friend,
the one who'll never betray you,
you always leave out one thing;
a secret life is that important.
Ave Atque Vale
Billy Collins
Even though I managed to swerve around the lump
of groundhog lying on its back on the road,
he traveled with me for miles,
a quiet passenger
who passed the time looking out the window
enjoying this new view of the woods
he once hobbled around in,
sleeping all day and foraging at night,
rising sometimes to consult the wind with his snout.
Last night he must have wandered
onto the road, hoping to slip
behind the curtain of soft ferns on the other side.
I see these forms every day
and always hope the next one up ahead
is a shredded tire, a discarded brown coat,
but there they are, assuming
every imaginable pose for death's portrait.
This one I speak of, for example,
the one who rode with me for miles,
reminded me of a small Roman citizen,
with his prosperous belly,
his faint smile,
and his one stiff forearm raised
as if he were still alive, still hailing Caesar.
That's all, folks. Be well, do good works, keep in touch.