Some warm poetry, for cold evenings:
- Molly Fisk, “Winter Sun” (We can make do with so little / just the hint of warmth, the slanted light.)
- Pat Schneider, “The Patience of Ordinary Things” (It is a kind of love, is it not? / how the cup holds the tea.)
- Barbara Ras, “Bite Every Sorrow” (You can speak a foreign language, sometimes / and it can mean something.)
- Jack Gilbert, “Failing and Flying” (Everyone forgets that Icarus also flew.)
- Lisel Mueller, “Things” (Even what was beyond us / was recast in our image; / we gave the country a heart, / the storm an eye)
- Rabindranath Tagore, “On the Seashore” (The sea plays with children, and pale gleams the smile of the sea-beach / On the seashore of endless worlds children meet)
- John O’Donohue, “Matins” (May I live this day / Compassionate of heart / Gentle in word / Courageous in thought)
- Wallace Stevens, “The House Was Quiet and The World Was Calm” (The summer night is like a perfection of thought. / The house was quiet because it had to be)
- Brian Patten, “Inessential Things” (Cats remember what is essential of days)
- Emily Dickinson, “Simplicity” (How happy is the little stone / that rambles in the road, alone)
- Yi Lu, “Valley’s Green” (flowers like tiny saucers — little bowls — little cups / filled to the brim with their own colors)
- Jacques Prévert, “How to Paint a Bird’s Portrait” (When the bird comes / if it comes / observe the most profound silence)
- Archibald MacLeish, “Eleven” (Happy as though he had no name, as though
/ He had been no one: like a leaf, a stem,
/ Like a root growing…)
- Denise Levertov, “A Woman Alone” (Then / self-pity dries up, a joy / untainted by guilt lifts her. / She has fears, but not about loneliness)
- Richard Brautigan, “Your Catfish Friend” (I’d love you and be your catfish / friend and drive such lonely / thoughts from your mind)
- Linda Gregg, “The Letter” (I’m not feeling strong yet, but I am taking / good care of myself)
- Andrew Lang, “Ballade of True Wisdom” (And I’d leave all the hurry, the noise, and the fray, / For a house full of books, and a garden of flowers)
- Ada Limón, “The Raincoat” (my whole life I’ve been under her / raincoat thinking it was somehow a marvel / that I never got wet.)
- Jorge Luis Borges, “The Just” (These people, unaware, are saving the world)
- Wendell Berry, “The Peace of Wild Things” (I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.)
