3 poems, that crossed my path this week
Special Glasses
I had to send away for them
because they are not available in any store.
They look the same as any sunglasses
with a light tint and silvery frames,
but instead of filtering out the harmful
rays of the sun,
they filter out the harmful sight of you --
you on the approach,
you waiting at my bus stop,
you, face in the evening window.
Every morning I put them on
and step out the side door
whistling a melody of thanks to my nose
and my ears for holding them in place, just so,
singing a song of gratitude
to the lens grinder at his heavy bench
and to the very lenses themselves
because they allow it all to come in, all but you.
How they know the difference
between the green hedges, the stone walls,
and you is beyond me,
yet the schoolbuses flashing in the rain
do come in, as well as the postman waving
and the mother and daughter dogs next door,
and then there is the tea kettle
about to play its chord-
everything sailing right in but you, girl.
Yes, just as the night air passes through the screen,
but not the mosquito,
and as water swirls down the drain,
but not the eggshell,
so the flowering trellis and the moon
pass through my special glasses, but not you.
Let us keep it this way, I say to myself,
as I lay my special glasses on the night table,
pull the chain on the lamp,
and say a prayer-unlike the song-
that I will not see you in my dreams.
-Billy Collins
If
If freckles were lovely, and day was night,
And measles were nice and a lie warn't a lie,
. Life would be delight,--
. But things couldn't go right
. For in such a sad plight
I wouldn't be I.
If earth was heaven and now was hence,
And past was present, and false was true,
. There might be some sense
. But I'd be in suspense
. For on such a pretense
You wouldn't be you.
If fear was plucky, and globes were square,
And dirt was cleanly and tears were glee
. Things would seem fair,--
. Yet they'd all despair,
. For if here was there
We wouldn't be we.
-ee cummings
The Lanyard
The other day as I was ricocheting slowly
off the pale blue walls of this room,
bouncing from typewriter to piano,
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
I found myself in the L section of the dictionary
where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.
No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one more suddenly into the past --
a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp
by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid thin plastic strips
into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.
I had never seen anyone use a lanyard
or wear one, if that’s what you did with them,
but that did not keep me from crossing
strand over strand again and again
until I had made a boxy
red and white lanyard for my mother.
She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sickroom,
lifted teaspoons of medicine to my lips,
set cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light
and taught me to walk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,
which I made with a little help from a counselor.
Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth,
and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,
and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now,
is a smaller gift--not the archaic truth
that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took
the two-tone lanyard from my hands,
I was as sure as a boy could be
that this useless, worthless thing I wove
out of boredom would be enough to make us even.
-Billy Collins
I had to send away for them
because they are not available in any store.
They look the same as any sunglasses
with a light tint and silvery frames,
but instead of filtering out the harmful
rays of the sun,
they filter out the harmful sight of you --
you on the approach,
you waiting at my bus stop,
you, face in the evening window.
Every morning I put them on
and step out the side door
whistling a melody of thanks to my nose
and my ears for holding them in place, just so,
singing a song of gratitude
to the lens grinder at his heavy bench
and to the very lenses themselves
because they allow it all to come in, all but you.
How they know the difference
between the green hedges, the stone walls,
and you is beyond me,
yet the schoolbuses flashing in the rain
do come in, as well as the postman waving
and the mother and daughter dogs next door,
and then there is the tea kettle
about to play its chord-
everything sailing right in but you, girl.
Yes, just as the night air passes through the screen,
but not the mosquito,
and as water swirls down the drain,
but not the eggshell,
so the flowering trellis and the moon
pass through my special glasses, but not you.
Let us keep it this way, I say to myself,
as I lay my special glasses on the night table,
pull the chain on the lamp,
and say a prayer-unlike the song-
that I will not see you in my dreams.
-Billy Collins
If
If freckles were lovely, and day was night,
And measles were nice and a lie warn't a lie,
. Life would be delight,--
. But things couldn't go right
. For in such a sad plight
I wouldn't be I.
If earth was heaven and now was hence,
And past was present, and false was true,
. There might be some sense
. But I'd be in suspense
. For on such a pretense
You wouldn't be you.
If fear was plucky, and globes were square,
And dirt was cleanly and tears were glee
. Things would seem fair,--
. Yet they'd all despair,
. For if here was there
We wouldn't be we.
-ee cummings
The Lanyard
The other day as I was ricocheting slowly
off the pale blue walls of this room,
bouncing from typewriter to piano,
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
I found myself in the L section of the dictionary
where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.
No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one more suddenly into the past --
a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp
by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid thin plastic strips
into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.
I had never seen anyone use a lanyard
or wear one, if that’s what you did with them,
but that did not keep me from crossing
strand over strand again and again
until I had made a boxy
red and white lanyard for my mother.
She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sickroom,
lifted teaspoons of medicine to my lips,
set cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light
and taught me to walk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,
which I made with a little help from a counselor.
Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth,
and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,
and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now,
is a smaller gift--not the archaic truth
that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took
the two-tone lanyard from my hands,
I was as sure as a boy could be
that this useless, worthless thing I wove
out of boredom would be enough to make us even.
-Billy Collins