#kate baer

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New Year
Kate Baer

Look at it, cold and wet like a newborn
calf. I want to tell it everything—how we
struggled, how we tore out our hair and
thumbed through rusted nails just to
stand for its birth. I want to say: look how
far we’ve come. Promise our resolutions.

But what does a baby care for oaths and
pledges? It only wants to live.

Hi. How are you? Shall we do this thing?

As a reminder, you can get a daily poem emailed to you in April by signing up here. Or catch it via Twitter, this Tumblr, or RSS. I’m glad you’re here.

Today in:

2021: Instructions on Not Giving Up, Ada Limón
2020:Motto, Bertolt Brecht
2019:Separation, W.S. Merwin
2018:Good Bones, Maggie Smith
2017:Better Days, A.F. Moritz
2016:Jenny Kiss’d Me, Leigh Hunt
2015:The Night House, Billy Collins
2014:Tim Riggins Speaks of Waterfalls, Nico Alvarado
2013:Nan Hardwicke Turns Into a Hare, Wendy Pratt
2012:A Short History of the Apple, Dorianne Laux
2011:New York Poem, Terrance Hayes
2010:On Wanting to Tell [ ] about a Girl Eating Fish Eyes, Mary Szybist
2009:A Little Tooth, Thomas Lux
2008:The Sciences Sing a Lullabye, Albert Goldbarth
2007:Elegy of Fortinbras, Zbigniew Herbert
2006:When Leather is a Whip, by Martin Espada
2005:Parents, William Meredith