THE MEN THAT DON'T FIT IN - Robert W. Service

There's a race of men that don't fit in,

    A race that can't stay still;

So they break the hearts of kith and kin,

    And they roam the world at will.

They range the field and they rove the flood,

    And they climb the mountain's crest;

Theirs is the curse of the gypsy blood,

    And they don't know how to rest.

If they just went straight they might go far;

    They are strong and brave and true;

But they're always tired of the things that are,

    And they want the strange and new.

They say: "Could I find my proper groove,

    What a deep mark I would make!"

So they chop and change, and each fresh move

    Is only a fresh mistake.

And each forgets, as he strips and runs

    With a brilliant, fitful pace,

It's the steady, quiet, plodding ones

    Who win in the lifelong race.

And each forgets that his youth has fled,

    Forgets that his prime is past,

Till he stands one day, with a hope that's dead,

    In the glare of the truth at last.

He has failed, he has failed; he has missed his chance;

    He has just done things by half.

Life's been a jolly good joke on him,

    And now is the time to laugh.

Ha, ha! He is one of the Legion Lost;

    He was never meant to win;

He's a rolling stone, and it's bred in the bone;

    He's a man who won't fit in.

a haiku about you - lc

i do not need a

flower’s petals to know that

you do not love me

The Poet With His Face in His Hands - Mary Oliver

You want to cry aloud for your

mistakes. But to tell the truth the world

doesn’t need any more of that sound.

So if you’re going to do it and can’t

stop yourself, if your pretty mouth can’t

hold it in, at least go by yourself across

the forty fields and the forty dark inclines

of rocks and water to the place where

the falls are flinging out their white sheets

like crazy, and there is a cave behind all that

jubilation and water-fun and you can

stand there, under it, and roar all you

want and nothing will be disturbed; you can

drip with despair all afternoon and still,

on a green branch, its wings just lightly touched

by the passing foil of the water, the thrush,

puffing out its spotted breast, will sing

of the perfect, stone-hard beauty of everything.

Thank-You Note - Wisława Szymborska (Translated from the Polish by Joanna Trzeciak)

I owe a lot

to those I do not love.

Relief in accepting

others care for them more.

Joy that I am not

wolf to their sheep.

Peace be with them

for with them I am free

––love neither gives

nor knows how to take these things.

I don't wait for them

from window to door.

Almost as patient

as a sun dial,

I understand

what love never could.

I forgive

what love never would.

Between rendezvous and letter

no eternity passes,

only a few days or weeks.

Our trips always turn out well:

concerts are enjoyed,

cathedrals toured,

landscapes in focus.

And when seven rivers and mountains

come between us,

they are the rivers and mountains

found on any map.

The credit's theirs

if I live in three dimensions,

in a non-lyrical and non-rhetorical space,

with a real, ever-shifting horizon.

They don't even know

how much they carry in their empty hands.

"I owe them nothing,"

love would have said

on this open topic.

Untitled - Nayyirah Waheed

do not

put

your hand

in the mouth of loneliness.

its teeth are soft

but it will scar you for life.

-- do not be seduced by the lonely ones

Going Without Saying (i.m. Joe Flynn) - Bernard O'Donoghue

It is a great pity we don't know

When the dead are going to die

So that, over a last companionable

Drink, we could tell them

How much we liked them.

Happy the man who, dying, can

Place his hand on his heart and say:

‘At least I didn't neglect to tell

The thrush how beautifully she sings.’

""It was wrong to do this," said the angel." - Stephen Crane

“It was wrong to do this,” said the angel.

“You should live like a flower,

Holding malice like a puppy,

Waging war like a lambkin.”

“Not so,” quoth the man

Who had no fear of spirits;

“It is only wrong for angels

Who can live like the flowers,

Holding malice like the puppies,

Waging war like the lambkins.”

You Must Accept - Kate Light

You must accept that’s who he really is.

You must accept you cannot be his

unless he is yours. No compromise.

He is a canvas on which paint never dries;

a clay that never sets, steel that bends

in a breeze, a melody that when it ends

no one can whistle. He is not who

you thought. He’s not. He is a shoe

that walks away: “I will not go where you

want to go.” “Why, then, are you a shoe?”

“I’m not. I have the sole of a lover

but don’t know what love is.” “Discover

it, then.” “Will I have to go where you go?”

“Sometimes.” “Be patient with you?” “Yes.” “Then, no.”

You have to hear what he is telling you

and see what he is; how it is killing you.