Tuesday Poem: "Getting Older" by Elaine Feinstein

The first surprise: I like it. 

Whatever happens now, some things 

that used to terrify have not: 

I didn't die young, for instance. Or lose 

my only love. My three children 

never had to run away from anyone. 

Don't tell me this gratitude is complacent. 

We all approach the edge of the same blackness 

which for me is silent. 

Knowing as much sharpens 

my delight in January freesia, 

hot coffee, winter sunlight. So we say 

as we lie close on some gentle occasion: 

every day won from such 

darkness is a celebration.

by Elaine Feinstein

For more information about poet, Elaine Feinstein, see:

https://www.poetryarchive.org/poet/elaine-feinstein

Tuesday Poem: "Circle" by Pádraig Ó Tuama

It’s funny how things come in
circles.
You, sitting on a step,
smoking a cigarette,
watching leaves fall off a
slowly stripping tree.
Me, hanging photos on a wall,
including one of you
receiving, like a priestess,
your lover’s confession.
Me telling stories of
your conversations.
You, weeping
when your dad asked you
how you were.
Me writing poems about life
while I was slowly plunging into
death.
You breathing in those
same lines,
sitting on a step,
smoking a cigarette.

by Pádraig Ó Tuama

For more information about the poet, Pádraig Ó Tuama, see:

https://poets.org/poet/padraig-o-tuama

Tuesday Poem: "air and light and time and space" by Charles Bukowski

'- you know, I've either had a family, a job, something
has always been in the
way
but now
I've sold my house, I've found this
place, a large studio, you should see the space and
the light.
for the first time in my life I'm going to have a place and
the time to
create.'

no baby, if you're going to create
you're going to create whether you work
16 hours a day in a coal mine
or
you're going to create in a small room with 3 children
while you're on
welfare,
you're going to create with part of your mind and your body blown
away,
you're going to create blind
crippled
demented,
you're going to create with a cat crawling up your
back while
the whole city trembles in earthquakes, bombardment,
flood and fire.

baby, air and light and time and space
have nothing to do with it
and don't create anything
except maybe a longer life to find
new excuses
for. 

by Charles Bukowski 

For more information on the poet, Charles Bukowski, see:

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/charles-bukowski

Tuesday Poem: "Women Whose Lives are Food, Men Whose Lives are Money" by Joyce Carol Oates

Mid-morning Monday she is staring
peaceful as the rain in that shallow back yard
she wears flannel bedroom slippers
she is sipping coffee
she is thinking—
                            —gazing at the weedy bumpy yard
at the faces beginning to take shape
in the wavy mud
in the linoleum
where floorboards assert themselves

Women whose lives are food
breaking eggs with care
scraping garbage from the plates
unpacking groceries hand over hand

Wednesday evening: he takes the cans out front
tough plastic with detachable lids
Thursday morning: the garbage truck whining at 7
Friday the shopping mall open till 9
bags of groceries unpacked
hand over certain hand

Men whose lives are money
time-and-a-half Saturdays
the lunchbag folded with care and brought back home
unfolded Monday morning

Women whose lives are food
because they are not punch-carded
because they are unclocked
sighing glad to be alone
staring into the yard, mid-morning
mid-week
by mid-afternoon everything is forgotten

There are long evenings
panel discussions on abortions, fashions, meaningful work
there are love scenes where people mouth passions
sprightly, handsome, silly, manic
in close-ups revealed ageless
the women whose lives are food
the men whose lives are money
fidget as these strangers embrace and weep and mis-
            understand and forgive and die and weep and embrace
and the viewers stare and fidget and sigh and
begin yawning around 10:30
never made it past midnight, even on Saturdays,
watching their braven selves perform

Where are the promised revelations?
Why have they been shown so many times?
Long-limbed children a thousand miles to the west
hitch-hiking in spring, burnt bronze in summer
thumbs nagging
eyes pleading
Give us a ride, huh? Give us a ride?

and when they return nothing is changed
the linoleum looks older
the Hawaiian Chicken is new
the girls wash their hair more often
the boys skip over the puddles
in the GM parking lot
no one eyes them with envy

their mothers stoop
the oven doors settle with a thump
the dishes are rinsed and stacked and
by mid-morning the house is quiet
it is raining out back
or not raining
the relief of emptiness rains
simple, terrible, routine
at peace

by Joyce Carol Oates

For more information about the poet, Joyce Carol Oates, see:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates