Sycamore leaf opening (Photo By Evelyn Simak, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=13441236)
Dear Readers, I think many of us were in shock after the US election results came in – I know that I had dreaded this result, but managed to convince myself that Harris stood a chance. What a mess. I am so sick of living in ‘interesting times’. My heart goes out to my American friends, with the threats to reproductive rights, the racism, the attacks on LGBT rights and the climate change denial. We will feel the effects here in the UK too, with the impacts on the war in Ukraine and possibly on other parts of Europe, particularly the Baltic states, with the potential for the break up of NATO, plus the risks associated with a major nuclear power governed by someone who is so random, and who has such thugs behind him. But still, we go on. And as usual, there is some solace in poetry, and if you have any that have helped or are helping at the moment, let me know and I’ll share them here.
I liked this one, by American poet Ada Limón.
Instructions on Not Giving Up
Ada Limón
1976 –
More than the fuchsia funnels breaking out
of the crabapple tree, more than the neighbor’s
almost obscene display of cherry limbs shoving
their cotton candy-colored blossoms to the slate
sky of Spring rains, it’s the greening of the trees
that really gets to me. When all the shock of white
and taffy, the world’s baubles and trinkets, leave
the pavement strewn with the confetti of aftermath,
the leaves come. Patient, plodding, a green skin
growing over whatever winter did to us, a return
to the strange idea of continuous living despite
the mess of us, the hurt, the empty. Fine then,
I’ll take it, the tree seems to say, a new slick leaf
unfurling like a fist to an open palm, I’ll take it all.
Photo by Giles Laurent, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
And this one, by Brendan Kennelly
“Begin”
Begin again to the summoning birds
to the sight of the light at the window,
begin to the roar of morning traffic
all along Pembroke Road.
Every beginning is a promise
born in light and dying in dark
determination and exaltation of springtime
flowering the way to work.
Begin to the pageant of queuing girls
the arrogant loneliness of swans in the canal
bridges linking the past and future
old friends passing though with us still.
Begin to the loneliness that cannot end
since it perhaps is what makes us begin,
begin to wonder at unknown faces
at crying birds in the sudden rain
at branches stark in the willing sunlight
at seagulls foraging for bread
at couples sharing a sunny secret
alone together while making good.
Though we live in a world that dreams of ending
that always seems about to give in
something that will not acknowledge conclusion
insists that we forever begin.
LaSalle Mural, Photo by Derek Bridges at https://www.flickr.com/photos/derek_b/4916431642
And I love this Maya Angelou classic, so hopeful, so defiant.
Still I Rise
Maya Angelou
1928 –
2014
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I’ll rise.
Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
’Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.
Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I’ll rise.
Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops,
Weakened by my soulful cries?
Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don’t you take it awful hard
’Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines
Diggin’ in my own backyard.
You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.
Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I’ve got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?
Out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
Up from a past that’s rooted in pain
I rise
I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.
And finally, this one. I love, love, love this poem. Sometimes it’s all about keeping on keeping on.
Optimism by Jane Hirschfield
More and more I have come to admire resilience.
Not the simple resistance of a pillow, whose foam
returns over and over to the same shape, but the sinuous
tenacity of a tree: finding the light newly blocked on one side,
it turns in another. A blind intelligence, true.
But out of such persistence arose turtles, rivers,
mitochondria, figs – all this resinous, unretractable earth.
Here is a poem that I found comfort in today. I appreciate the plant imagery.
Citizen of Dark Times
Agenda in a time of fear: Be not afraid.
When things go wrong, do right.
Set out by the half-light of the seeker.
For the well-lit problem begins to heal.
Learn tropism toward the difficult.
We have not arrived to explain, but to sing.
Young idealism ripens into an ethical life.
Prune back regret to let faith grow.
When you hit rock bottom, dig farther down.
Grief is the seed of singing, shame the seed of song.
Keep seeing what you are not saying.
Plunder your reticence.
Songbird guards a twig, its only weapon a song.
—by Kim Stafford, from Wild Honey, Tough Salt
I love Still I Rise, but omg, it is AMAZING when you hear her read it aloud. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qviM_GnJbOM
Oh my goodness, this is astonishing! Thank you!
Also, the wise words of Langston Hughes:
Tired
I am so tired of waiting,
Aren’t you,
For the world to become good
And beautiful and kind?
Let us take a knife
And cut the world in two —
And see what worms are eating.
Great poems of comfort and defiance! And Still I Rise is one of my favourites, I was lucky enough to see Maya Angelou live in the 90s in Manchester, so I have experienced it in person 🙂
Oh my goodness! That must have really been something….
And this new poem by Venice Williams
The Very Same Country
You are awakening to the
same country you fell asleep to.
The very same country.
Pull yourself together.
And,
when you see me,
do not ask me
“What do we do now?
How do we get through the next four years?”
Some of my Ancestors dealt with
at least 400 years of this
under worse conditions.
Continue to do the good work.
Continue to build bridges not walls.
Continue to lead with compassion.
Continue the demanding work
of liberation for all.
Continue to dismantle broken systems,
large and small.
Continue to set the best example
for the children.
Continue to be a vessel of nourishing joy.
Continue right where you are.
Right where you live into your days.
Do so in the name of
The Creator who expects
nothing less from each of us.
And if you are not “continuing”
ALL of the above,
in community, partnership, collaboration?
What is it you have been doing?
What is it you are waiting for?
I live in America and I can tell you : I and all my friends woke up sick yesterday with disappointment, sick with dismay, sick with worry for all who will be hurt by this. Most of all we are sick at the thought our fellow citizens have chosen lies, most of them absurd , and viciousness. But here we are and as almost all these lovely poems express, we must get on with life. We can’t let our days be poisoned by this grotesque man. We will support and encourage each other, we will mitigate his harms where we can and we will work toward the day when we again have a government that will do the same. Remember how many Americans worked against this; we’re still here. Just as reading Bug Woman helped me bear up during the pandemic, I know she will be a bright moment in the mornings ahead. Many, many thanks.
Thank you for this, Susan – I know so many of my American friends feel exactly the same, and they won’t give up fighting for what American could be. I’m glad that the blog helps even in a small way…..
Thank you, Michael. Poetry definitely helps!