Poetic Medicine

By Nancy Willard  “Ah, William, we’re weary of weather,” said the sunflowers, shining with dew. “Our traveling habits have tired us. Ca...

(For we remember the story and must tell it again so we may all live) By Joy Harjo Beneath a sky blurred with mist and wind, I am amazed as ...

By Naomi Shihab Nye We will call you "Agua" like the rivers and cool jugs. We will persuade the clouds to nestle around your ne...

By Jay Smooth OK people We really got our sights on it Bottom of the ninth, two outs and two strikes on it But we need to keep focused ...

By Lawrence Raab Death is easier than love. And true feeling, as someone said, leaves no memory. Or else memory replaces the past, which ...

By Muriel  Rukeyser I lived in the first century of world wars. Most mornings I would be more or less insane, The newspapers would arriv...

By R.S. Thomas My luminary, my morning and evening star. My light at noon when there is no sun and the sky lowers. My balance of joy in a ...

By Li-Young Lee  I buried my father in the sky. Since then, the birds clean and comb him every morning and pull the blanket up to hi...

  By Bonnie Lyons "Think of the thrill ,” I said trying to persuade my two best friends to rob the Chase bank on 41 st  Street we...

By Ron Koertge Give up sitting dutifully at your desk. Leave your house or apartment. Go out into the world. It's all right to carry...

By Brianna Ireland Not all angels go to heaven. Sometimes angels go to hell. I know this, cuz I watched you slip. And loaded ...

By Deborah Paredez The day upturned, flooded with sunlight, not a single cloud. I squint into the glare, cautious even then of bri...

By Carol Ann Duffy  The  crown translates a woman to a Queen – endless gold, circling itself, an O like a well, fathomless, for the yea...

Lyrics by Poi Dog Pondering, music by Frank Orrall   Wishing like a mountain and thinking like the sea  How it is to feel absolu...

By Karen Alkalay-Gut   “Spit it...

By Walt Whitman After threescore and ten With all their chances, changes, losses, sorrows, My parents' deaths, the vagaries of my li...

By A. J. Huffman    I felt guilty as the phone book slammed to the ground like an anvil in some childhood animation. The whole scene w...

By Adam Zagajewski Between the computer, a pencil, and a typewriter half my day passes. One day it will be half a century. I live in str...

By  Fred D'Aguiar What a smile! One large lamp for a face, smaller lanterns where skin stretches over bones waiting for muscle, bo...

By William Stafford Never again for any glorious thing      Stand in unison,      Or repeat after a leader      Or wear an award. Alwa...