Category: Repost

“If You Knew” by Ellen Bass (repost) and “Soul Makossa” by Manu Dibango

On By Christina's WordsIn Poetry, Repost6 Comments

What if you knew you’d be the last
to touch someone?
If you were taking tickets, for example,
at the theater, tearing them,
giving back the ragged stubs,
you might take care to touch that palm,
brush your fingertips
along the life line’s crease.

When a man pulls his wheeled suitcase
too slowly through the airport, when
the car in front of me doesn’t signal,
when the clerk at the pharmacy
won’t say Thank you, I don’t remember
they’re going to die.

A friend told me she’d been with her aunt.
They’d just had lunch and the waiter,
a young gay man with plum black eyes,
joked as he served the coffee, kissed
her aunt’s powdered cheek when they left.
Then they walked half a block and her aunt
dropped dead on the sidewalk.

How close does the dragon’s spume
have to come? How wide does the crack
in heaven have to split?
What would people look like
if we could see them as they are,
soaked in honey, stung and swollen,
reckless, pinned against time?

“If You Knew” by Ellen Bass from The Human Line

originally posted: 4/18/14

“Soul Makossa” by Manu Dibango (12 December 1933 – 24 March 2020). Sadly Dibango died in Paris today from Covid-19, but he left a legacy of music to shine upon the world.

For a much needed smile, watch the above video of his song “Soul Makossa”; the dancing may inspire your own dance party, or at least bring you a moment of joy. Remember, as Bob Marley sang,  “Love would never leave us alone, A-yin the darkness there must come out to light.”

Look for the light my friends, -christy

“Ten Thousand Flowers in Spring” by Wu-Men (repost)

On By Christina's WordsIn Poetry, Repost

Ten thousand flowers in spring, the moon in autumn,
a cool breeze in summer, snow in winter.
If your mind isn’t clouded by unnecessary things,
this is the best season of your life.

“Ten Thousand Flowers in Spring” by Wu-Men, The Enlightened Heart: An Anthology of Sacred Poetry. © Harper Perennial, 1993.

(originally shared 3/16/15)

“mind and heart” by Charles Bukowski (repost)

On By Christina's WordsIn Poetry, Repost1 Comment

unaccountably we are alone
forever alone
and it was meant to be
that way,
it was never meant
to be any other way–
and when the death struggle
begins
the last thing I wish to see
is
a ring of human faces
hovering over me–
better just my old friends,
the walls of my self,
let only them be there.

I have been alone but seldom
lonely.
I have satisfied my thirst
at the well
of my self
and that wine was good,
the best I ever had,
and tonight
sitting
staring into the dark
I now finally understand
the dark and the
light and everything
in between.

peace of mind and heart
arrives
when we accept what
is:
having been
born into this
strange life
we must accept
the wasted gamble of our
days
and take some satisfaction in
the pleasure of
leaving it all
behind.

cry not for me.

grieve not for me.

read
what I’ve written
then
forget it
all.

drink from the well
of your self
and begin
again.

Bukowski, Charles. Come On In!: New Poems. New York: Ecco (An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers), 2006.

(Originally shared on 12/27/16)

“The Resemblance Between Your Life and a Dog” by Robert Bly (repost)

On By Christina's WordsIn Poetry, Repost1 Comment

I never intended to have this life, believe me—
It just happened. You know how dogs turn up
At a farm, and they wag but can’t explain.

It’s good if you can accept your life—you’ll notice
Your face has become deranged trying to adjust
To it. Your face thought your life would look

Like your bedroom mirror when you were ten.
That was a clear river touched by mountain wind.
Even your parents can’t believe how much you’ve changed.

Sparrows in winter, if you’ve ever held one, all feathers,
Burst out of your hand with a fiery glee.
You see them later in hedges. Teachers praise you,

But you can’t quite get back to the winter sparrow.
Your life is a dog. He’s been hungry for miles,
Doesn’t particularly like you, but gives up, and comes in.

Robert Bly, from Eating the Honey of Words (Perennial).

Originally shared 6/22/15.

“What Do Women Want?” by Kim Addonizio

On By Christina's WordsIn Poetry, Repost5 Comments

I want a red dress.
I want it flimsy and cheap,
I want it too tight, I want to wear it
until someone tears it off me.
I want it sleeveless and backless,
this dress, so no one has to guess
what’s underneath. I want to walk down
the street past Thrifty’s and the hardware store
with all those keys glittering in the window,
past Mr. and Mrs. Wong selling day-old
donuts in their café, past the Guerra brothers
slinging pigs from the truck and onto the dolly,
hoisting the slick snouts over their shoulders.
I want to walk like I’m the only
woman on earth and I can have my pick.
I want that red dress bad.
I want it to confirm
your worst fears about me,
to show you how little I care about you
or anything except what
I want. When I find it, I’ll pull that garment
from its hanger like I’m choosing a body
to carry me into this world, through
the birth-cries and the love-cries too,
and I’ll wear it like bones, like skin,
it’ll be the goddamned
dress they bury me in.

“What Do Women Want?” by Kim Addonizio from Tell Me (BOA Editions Ltd.)

originally posted: 6/14/14

“If Love is a Red Dress (Hang Me in Rags) by Maria McKee