EXAGGERATION - Scarriet Editors

You must know I’m not usually excitable,

But how long must I be calm and pleasantly glad?

I have read about love. It was sad.

The man paced outside the window. The woman

Covered her arms in folds of crimson and myrtle.

The tradition arrived every night this year.

Every woman attended. This is no exaggeration;

They crowded, they pushed ahead—even the dearest woman.

I affected learning. I thought this decision up in my own mind.

The poetry readings, seminars; failures in oak,

Scratches, graffiti, partly undressed tables, inside and outside the mind.

I affected poetry. It did no good. I was too calm;

I went on in hushed tones about my childhood;

Stood near her by the window, even laughed.

It wouldn’t do to repeat it now, even if I could.

There is a need to exaggerate, even without drama or poems,

To not flag, to make oneself happy; to pretend a woman’s figure

Will make one happy, and this is all a man needs.

Life is dull. We exaggerate. And so it proceeds.

NOT GETTING CLOSER - Jack Gilbert

Walking in the dark streets of Seoul

under the almost full moon.

Lost for the last two hours.

Finishing a loaf of bread

and worried about the curfew.

I have not spoken for three days

and I am thinking, “Why not just

settle for love? Why not just

settle for love instead?”

The Weeping - Franz Wright

He has considered weeping, only

he can’t even bring himself to

 

take a stab at it. He just can’t cry–

it is terrible to cry

 

when you’re by yourself, because

what then?

 

Nothing is solved,

nobody comes;

even solitary children understand. This

apparent respite, apparent quenching

 

of the need to be befriended

might (much like love in later years) leave you

 

lonelier than when you were merely alone?

Camino Real - Richard Shelton

each makes his path

his small path

quickly overgrown

but leading him slowly

to where he is going

which is not

where he is planning to go

and when the last vine

or bamboo is cut

he emerges into a clearing

each into a different

clearing

where some are met

by cannibals some by lovers

some by friends

and some by nothing

except a clearing

a sky with stars at night

and by day an unexpected

view of the next hill

which is reason enough

for the long journey

more than reason enough

After Years - Ted Kooser

Today, from a distance, I saw you

walking away, and without a sound

the glittering face of a glacier

slid into the sea. An ancient oak

fell in the Cumberlands, holding only

a handful of leaves, and an old woman

scattering corn to her chickens looked up

for an instant. At the other side

of the galaxy, a star thirty-five times

the size of our own sun exploded

and vanished, leaving a small green spot

on the astronomer's retina

as he stood in the great open dome

of my heart with no one to tell.