Loaf and the World Loafs With You

My son quit his job. He didn't enjoy it. Like we all really love our jobs everyday, don't we?

He said—

I meant to do my work today
But a brown bird sang in the apple tree,
And a butterfly flitted across the field,
And all the leaves were calling me.

And the wind went sighing over the land,
Tossing the grasses to and fro,
And a rainbow held out its shining hand—
So what could I do but laugh and go?

Richard Le Gallienne



She said—

The people I love the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half-submerged balls.

I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.

I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.

The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.

Marge Piercy

Before Xanax, Poetry

I had two anxiety attacks this past weekend - two full-blown, heart-thumping, limb-shaking, breath-stealing attacks. They happened early in the day, two days in a row, in my own bedroom, after a good night's sleep, for no apparent reason. If your body can turn on you under those circumstances, when are you safe? These two poems are such powerful descriptions of anxiety, I had to share them.
 

He said:

It was the same
as an immense dusk of happy gold,
suddenly extinguished
in ashen clouds.

It left me with that gloom
of great anxieties
when they are shut up in the cage
of daily truth, with that burden
of ideally colored gardens
which an oil-filthy fire rubs out.

I did not give in,
I wept for it. I forced it. I saw ridiculous
unreason in the candid brotherhood
of man and life,
of death and man.

And here I am, ridiculously alive, waiting,
Ridiculously dead, for death.

Juan Ramon Jimenez

She said:

 
It was not death, for I stood up,
And all the dead lie down;
It was not night, for all the bells
Put out their tongues, for noon.

It was not frost, for on my flesh
I felt siroccos crawl, --
Nor fire, for just my marble feet
Could keep a chancel cool.

And yet it tasted like them all;
The figures I have seen
Set orderly, for burial,
Reminded me of mine,

As if my life were shaven
And fitted to a frame,
And could not breathe without a key;
And ‘t was like midnight, some,

When everything that ticked has stopped,
And space stares, all around,
Or grisly frosts, first autumn morns,
Repeal the beating ground.

But most like chaos, -- stopless, cool, --
Without a chance or spar,
Or even a report of land
To justify despair.

Emily Dickinson
 

Room With A (Point of) View

He said—

 
Necessity
 
Work?
I don’t have to work.
I don’t have to do nothing
but eat, drink, stay black, and die.
This little old furnished room’s
so small I can’t whip a cat
without getting fur in my mouth
and my landlady’s so old
her features is all run together
and God knows she sure can overcharge—
Which is why I reckon I does
Have to work after all.
 
Langston Hughes 
  
 

She said—

 
Rent
 
If you want my apartment, sleep in it
but let’s have a clear understanding:
the books are still free agents.
 
If the rocking chair’s arms surround you
they can also let you go,
they can shape the air like a body.
 
I don’t want your rent, I want
a radiance of attention
like the candle’s flame when we eat.
 
I mean a kind of awe
attending the spaces between us—
Not a roof but a field of stars. 
 
Jane Cooper

Every room comes with a price.

A Kiss Is Just a Kiss

He said—

 
Jenny kissed me when we met,
Jumping from the chair she sat in;
Time, you thief! Who loves to get
Sweets into your list, put that in:
Say I'm weary, say I'm sad,
Say that health and wealth have missed me,
Say I'm growing old, but add, -
Jenny kissed me.
 
 
Leigh Hunt
 
 
 

She said—

 
I hoped that he would love me,
And he has kissed my mouth,
But I am like a stricken bird
That cannot reach the south.
For tho’ I know he loves me,
Tonight my heart is sad;
His kiss was not so wonderful
As all the dreams I had.
 
Sara Teasdale 
 

Poetry as Dialogue

He said—
 
A Broken Appointment
 
You did not come,
And marching Time drew on, and wore me numb.
Yet less for loss of your dear presence there
Than that I thus found lacking in your make
That high compassion which can overcome
Reluctance for pure loving kindness’ sake.
Grieved I, when, as the lop-hour stroked its sum,
You did not come.
 
You love not me,
And love alone can lend you loyalty,
-I know and knew it. But, unto the store
Of human deeds divine in all but name,
Was it not worth a little hour or more
To add yet this: Once you, a woman, came
To soothe a time-torn man, even though it be
You love not me?
 
Thomas Hardy
 
 
She said—

You thought that I was that type:
That you could forget me,
And that I'd plead and weep and throw myself
Under the hooves of a bay mare,
Or that I'd ask the sorcerers
For some magic potion made from roots
And send you a terrible gift:
My precious perfumed handkerchief.
Damn you! I will not grant
Your cursed soul vicarious tears or a single glance.
And I swear to you by the garden of the angels,
I swear by the miracle-working icon,
And by the fire and smoke of our nights:
I will never come back to you

Anna Akhmatova
translated by Richard McKane