#this modern life
Try to Praise the Mutilated World
Adam Zagajewski
translated from Polish by Clare Cavanagh
Try to praise the mutilated world.
Remember June’s long days,
and wild strawberries, drops of rosé wine.
The nettles that methodically overgrow
the abandoned homesteads of exiles.
You must praise the mutilated world.
You watched the stylish yachts and ships;
one of them had a long trip ahead of it,
while salty oblivion awaited others.
You’ve seen the refugees going nowhere,
you’ve heard the executioners sing joyfully.
You should praise the mutilated world.
Remember the moments when we were together
in a white room and the curtain fluttered.
Return in thought to the concert where music flared.
You gathered acorns in the park in autumn
and leaves eddied over the earth’s scars.
Praise the mutilated world
and the gray feather a thrush lost,
and the gentle light that strays and vanishes
and returns.
–
Ah, friends. This month feels like it vanished in a blink. The years in between each April are also starting to fly past. A la Thomas Lux. I hope you found some comfort or delight these past 30 days and I hope we can do it again next year. In the meantime: be good to yourself. Take care out there.
Today in:
2021: In Defense of a Long Engagement, Mairead Small Staid
2020:Lines Written in the Days of Growing Darkness, Mary Oliver
2019:Starlings in Winter, Mary Oliver
2018:Born Yesterday, Philip Larkin
2017:Thus, He Spoke His Quietus, Thomas Lux
2016:Trees, W.S. Merwin
2015:Today and Two Thousand Years from Now, Philip Levine
2014:from For a Long Time I Have Wanted to Write a Happy Poem, Richard Jackson
2013:Tear It Down, Jack Gilbert
2012:from An Atlas of the Difficult World, Adrienne Rich
2011:Wandering Around an Albuquerque Airport Terminal, Naomi Shihab Nye
2010:from Pioneers! O Pioneers!, Walt Whitman
2009:from The Waste Land, T.S. Eliot
2008:from Five-Finger Exercises, T.S. Eliot
2007:Journey of the Magi, T.S. Eliot
2006:Preludes, T.S. Eliot
2005:A Song for Simeon, T.S. Eliot
Meditations in an Emergency
Cameron Awkward-Rich
I wake up & it breaks my heart. I draw the blinds & the thrill of rain breaks my heart. I go outside. I ride the train, walk among the buildings, men in Monday suits. The flight of doves, the city of tents beneath the underpass, the huddled mass, old women hawking roses, & children all of them, break my heart. There’s a dream I have in which I love the world. I run from end to end like fingers through her hair. There are no borders, only wind. Like you, I was born. Like you, I was raised in the institution of dreaming. Hand on my heart. Hand on my stupid heart.
==
Today in:
2021: How the Trees on Summer Nights Turn into a Dark River, Barbara Crooker
2020:Ash, Tracy K. Smith
2019:Under Stars, Dorianne Laux
2018:Afterlife,Natalie Eilbert
2017:There Are Birds Here, Jamaal May
2016:Poetry, Richard Kenney
2015:Dreaming at the Ballet, Jack Gilbert
2014:Vocation, Sandra Beasley
2013:Near the Race Track, Brigit Pegeen Kelly
2012:from Ask Him, Raymond Carver
2011:Sweet Star Chisel, Dearest Flaming Crumbs in Your Beard Lord, John Rybicki
2010:Rain Travel, W.S. Merwin
2009:Goodnight, Li-Young Lee
2008:Bearhug, Michael Ondaatje
2007:Meditation at Lagunitas, Robert Hass
2006:Autumn, Rainer Maria Rilke
2005:On Turning Ten, Billy Collins
We Lived Happily During the War
Ilya Kaminsky
And when they bombed other people’s houses, we
protested
but not enough, we opposed them but not
enough. I was
in my bed, around my bed America
was falling: invisible house by invisible house by invisible
house.
I took a chair outside and watched the sun.
In the sixth month
of a disastrous reign in the house of money
in the street of money in the city of money in the country of
money,
our great country of money, we (forgive us)
lived happily during the war.
–
Today in:
2021: Hurry, Marie Howe
2020:Oh, Robert Creeley
2019:It Was Summer Now and the Colored People Came Out Into the Sunshine, Morgan Parker
2018:In Two Seconds, Mark Doty
2017:Aubade, Louis MacNeice
2016:Before, Ada Limón
2015:Sign for My Father, Who Stressed the Bunt, David Bottoms
2014:Ullapool Bike Ride, Chris Powici
2013:Clothespins, Stuart Dybek
2012:Ghost Story, Matthew Dickman
2011:Graves We Filled Before the Fire, Gabrielle Calvocoressi
2010:On Being Asked To Write A Poem Against The War In Vietnam, Hayden Carruth
2009:The Bear-Boy of Lithuania, Amy Gerstler
2008:Today’s News, David Tucker
2007:All There is to Know About Adolph Eichmann, Leonard Cohen
2006:Gamin, Frank O’Hara
2005:[this is what you love: more people. you remember], D.A. Powell
