Humankind
Poems
Humankind
Does the heart have memory?
Do we walk across sand and earth
with dreams in our teeth
like a tango dancer with a red rose in Rio?
Do we marvel at cathedrals like Notre Dame
And the blue violet rosette stained glass of Chartres
as if our vision is one giant kaleidoscope?
Do we dance to the rhythms of the
unkindness? Maybe only the ravens know.
Do we dive into coral reefs to see just how blue the sea is or how vibrant the pink octopus
lives in collaboration with the translucent sea anemones?
Do we choose love even though our hearts are messy and tender?
Do we stand between the Sequoia in Muir Woods and realize our smallness?
Do we honor the Kingfisher in Sri Lanka
As well as the funny fruitbat with five lovers?
Do we savor a baguette on hikes through
the lavender meadows of Provence?
Do we travel to space just to feel closer
to the moon as the blue dot of water spins below?
Do we paint seashells and collect stones in our pockets as a daily practice?
Do we adopt the wise soul of a Labrador puppy with paws larger than our hearts can possibly hold?
Do we weave words into rhyme to delight
the unexpected reader searching for a muse?
Do we plant bulbs in the fall to delight
in their pulsing growth through dark spring soil?
Do we give voice to melodies to shift the silence into song?
Do we sit in silence and solitude to hear our own souls?
Do we savor each serendipitous serenade with
one another to defy gravity?
SONG OF THE SEA BY RAINER MARIA RILKE
Timeless sea breezes,
sea-wind of the night:
you come for no one;
if someone should wake,
he must be prepared
how to survive you.
Timeless sea breezes,
that for aeons have
blown ancient rocks,
you are purest space
coming from afar…
Oh, how a fruit-bearing
fig tree feels your coming
high up in the moonlight.
Blue Heron of South Carolina
A Blue Heron stands still
hungry for the silver, iridescent minnows
Swimming around the mossy stones
She dives into the green placid pond
Splash!
Birds like messengers
Sing liberation
Melodies for us all to enjoy
Each one’s unique song
Like a celebratory morning prayer
A meditation on being
Sometimes though the call is mournful
A chick has fallen too soon from the nest
She gathers her other tiny fledglings
Feeds them from the day’s hunt
Their open mouths eager to swallow
The world.
Heron Rises from The Dark, Summer Pond
So heavy
is the long-necked, long-bodied heron,
always it is a surprise
when her smoke-colored wings
open
and she turns
from the thick water,
from the black sticks
of the summer pond,
and slowly
rises into the air
and is gone.
Then, not for the first or the last time,
I take the deep breath
of happiness, and I think
how unlikely it is
that death is a hole in the ground,
how improbable
that ascension is not possible,
though everything seems so inert, so nailed
back into itself–
the muskrat and his lumpy lodge,
the turtle,
the fallen gate.
And especially it is wonderful
that the summers are long
and the ponds so dark and so many,
and therefore it isn’t a miracle
but the common thing,
this decision,
this trailing of the long legs in the water,
this opening up of the heavy body
into a new life: see how the sudden
gray-blue sheets of her wings
strive toward the wind; see how the clasp of nothing
takes her in.
GRIEF: The Dance of One Million
Have you ever sat in the
eye of a storm?
Do you close your eyes
and listen to the sun
hum and roar?
Then you know
solar storms come and go.
Do you taste the
sweet sour persimmon
not yet ripe?
Then you know sweetness is worth waiting for.
Do you hear the Blue Bunting singing a prayer
on the wind?
Then you know the vibrant blue is like the sea.
Do you curl in a ball from the sound of anguished cries no one else hears?
Then you know
tears are healing.
Do you greet new trees
with the palm of your hand on
her bark?
Then you know
the Crepe Myrtle feels like smooth bone.
Do you hold your beloveds
close as the day’s light disappears
from view?
Then you know why we invented fire.
Do you smell the pollen of the
Lilac blooms?
And the oil spilled in the alley?
Then you know
the aroma lives in memory like photos.
Do you scream rage
into your pillow at night?
Do you weep sitting in the shower
of water falling over your head?
Do you dance
beneath the harvest moon
howl just to feel
the rhythm of your
soul? Then you know
the dance of grief.
New Day’s Lyric
May this be the day
We come together.
Mourning, we come to mend,
Withered, we come to weather,
Torn, we come to tend,
Battered, we come to better.
Tethered by this year of yearning,
We are learning
That though we weren’t ready for this,
We have been readied by it.
We steadily vow that no matter
How we are weighed down,
We must always pave a way forward.
This hope is our door, our portal.
Even if we never get back to normal,
Someday we can venture beyond it,
To leave the known and take the first steps.
So let us not return to what was normal,
But reach toward what is next.
What was cursed, we will cure.
What was plagued, we will prove pure.
Where we tend to argue, we will try to agree,
Those fortunes we forswore, now the future we foresee,
Where we weren’t aware, we’re now awake;
Those moments we missed
Are now these moments we make,
The moments we meet,
And our hearts, once all together beaten,
Now all together beat.
Come, look up with kindness yet,
For even solace can be sourced from sorrow.
We remember, not just for the sake of yesterday,
But to take on tomorrow.
We heed this old spirit,
In a new day’s lyric,
In our hearts, we hear it:
For auld lang syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne.
Be bold, sang Time this year,
Be bold, sang Time,
For when you honor yesterday,
Tomorrow ye will find.
Know what we’ve fought
Need not be forgot nor for none.
It defines us, binds us as one,
Come over, join this day just begun.
For wherever we come together,
We will forever overcome.
— Amanda Gorman
The Color Yellow
for Laura
You are my yellow
the yellow of lemon zest
daffodils in April
the marigolds around
my grandmother’s tomato plants
to eschew insects and
hungry creatures
the yellow of
the one soft sweater
we bought at a thrift
store last February
after
plunging into the blue grey sea
the yellow of a sunrise
in an orange sky as
the green rain fell
like staccato
against the tin roof
of your garden shed
turned writer’s studio
To say you are
my yellow would
be like cheating at cards
the vast spectrum of you
Nothing less then
a kaléidoscope
on the brightest
summer’s day.
-Amy Razeghi
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Special thanks to Jolene Handy Ruth Stroud Muffetry Sondra Imperati Bonnie Solomon Amy Brown Teneia Sanders Tererai Trent Jane Ratcliffe Amy Gabrielle Anne Lamott 🌱
What a lovely bouquet of poems! I enjoyed all of them, especially about the sea!
Thank you, Bonnie!!!