Poem About Morning

Poem About Morning

by William Meredith, from Good Poems, ed. Garrison Keillor, 1995

Whether its sunny or not, it's sure

To be enormously complex--

Trees or streets outdoors, indoors whoever you share,

And yourself, thirsty, hungry, washing,

An attitude towards sex.

No wonder half of you wants to stay

With your head dark and wishing

Rather than take it all on again:

Weren't you duped yesterday?

Things are not orderly here, no matter what they say.

But the clock goes off, if you have a dog

It wags, if you get up now you'll be less

Late. Life is some kind of loathsome hag

Who is forever threatening to turn beautiful.

Now she gives you a quick toothpaste kiss

And puts a glass of cold cranberry juice,

Like a big fake garnet, in your hand.

Cranberry juice! You're lucky, on the whole,

But there is a great deal about it you don't understand.

The Companionable Dark

The Companionable Dark

by Kathleen Norris, from Little Girls in Church, 1995

of here and now,

seed lying dormant

in the earth. The dark

to which all lost things come -- scarves

and rings and precious photographs, and

of course, our beloved

dead. The brooding dark,

our most vulnerable hours, limbs loose

in sleep, mouths agape.

The faithful dark,

where each door leads,

each one of us, alone.

The dark of God come close

as breath, our one companion

all the way through, the dark

of a needle's eye.

Not the easy dark

of dusk and candles,

but dark from which comforts flee.

The deep down dark

of one by one,

dark of wind

and dust, dark in which stars burn.

The floodwater dark

of hope, Jesus in agony

in the garden, Esther pacing

her bitter palace. A dark

by which we see, dark like truth,

like flesh on bone:

Help me, who am alone,

and have no help but thee.

where we are

where we are

by Gerald Locklin, from Good Poems, ed. Garrison Keillor, 2002

i envy those

who live in two places:

new york, say, and london;

wales and spain;

l.a. and paris;

hawaii and switzerland.

there is always the anticipation

of the change, the chance that what is wrong

is the result of where you are. i have

always loved both the freshness of

arriving and the relief of leaving. with

two homes every move would be a homecoming.

i am not even considering the weather, hot

or cold, dry or wet: i am talking about hope.

Welcome Morning

Welcome Morning

by Anne Sexton, from Good Poems, ed. Garrison Keillor, 2002

There is joy

in all:

in the hair I brush each morning,

in the Cannon towel, newly washed,

that I rub my body with each morning,

in the chapel of eggs I cook

each morning,

in the outcry from the kettle

that heats my coffee

each morning,

in the spoon and the chair

that cry "hello there, Anne"

each morning,

in the godhead of the table

that I set my silver, plate, cup upon

each morning.

All this is God,

right here in my pea-green house

each morning

and I mean,

though often forget,

to give thanks,

to faint down by the kitchen table

in a prayer of rejoicing

as the holy birds at the kitchen window

peck into their marriage of seeds.

So while I think of it,

let me paint a thank-you on my palm

for this God, this laughter of the morning,

lest it go unspoken.

The Joy that isn't shared, I've heard,

dies young.

What Song, Then?

What Song, Then?

by Kathleen Norris, from Little Girls in Church, 1995

When my life is alien soil

and a wind

like fear

makes restless ground

of all I have done--

what song, then,

to send out roots

that will drink the rain

that does not come--

how could I sing?

Watch light come

from dark and mist rise

from waters

as sky and shore

emerge out of night,

and a tree half-green,

half-bare.

Half-afraid of what is in me

(though God has called it good)

I sob over nothing,

desires I cannot name.

Sing us, they say,

a song you remember...