Poems to Celebrate New Beginnings

Here are a few quotes which describe my start in the New Year, courtesy of The Poetry Foundation, The Poetry Archive and my own bookshelves.

So much of any year is flammable,

lists of vegetables, partial poems.

Orange swirling flame of days,

so little is a stone.

Quick dance, shuffle of losses and leaves,

only the things I didn’t do

crackle after the blazing dies.    (Naomi Shihab Nye)

The problem

of time.          Of there not being

enough of it.

My girl came to the study

and said Help me;

I told her I had a time problem

which meant:

I would die for you but I don’t have ten minutes.

Hawking says

there are little folds in time

(actually he calls them wormholes)

but I say:

there’s a universe beyond

where they’re hammering the brass cut-outs .. .

Push us out in the boat and leave time here—

(because: where in the plan was it written,

You’ll be too busy to close parentheses,

the snapdragon’s bunchy mouth needs water,

even the caterpillar will hurry past you?   (Brenda Hillman)

How far is far?

And how many ways to get there?

We walk

and walk towards meaning

and don’t arrive    (Mahmoud Darwish)

The trees are coming into leaf,

like something almost being said. […]

Last year is dead, they seem to say,

Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.   (Philip Larkin)

much against everyone’s advice

I have decided to live the life

I want to read about and write it

not by visiting the graves of authors    (Sam Riviere)

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