A Tidings of Magpies

by Anne Porter Wild geese are flocking and calling in pure golden air, Glory like that which painters long ago Spread as a background for some little hermit Beside his cave, giving his cloak away, Or for some martyr stretching out On her expected rack. A few black cedars grow nearby And there's a donkey grazing. Small craftsmen, steeped in anonymity like bees, Gilded their wooden panels, leaving fame to chance, Like the maker of this wing-flooded golden sky, Who forgives all our ignorance Both of his nature and of his very name, Freely accepting our one heedless glance.

by John Estes Perhaps, after all, it is merely a desire to use the word thanatopsical — but if you can wash or handle artifacts like this blue tea mug, carried from Crete as a gift from a friend, or this nacreous orange bowl, a honeymoon souvenir bought in a now-defunct artists' shop in Colorado, or this antique Chinese mudman carrying his sponges and fish from a day at the pier, without a pathological fixation on the day you will stumble and drop it, or smack it against the sink divider or brush it with a hand reaching for the letter opener, you are junzi : a superior person, as Confucius had it. You probably make love to your spouse without imagining betrayal and pay taxes without complaint because you think nothing in truth belongs to you. They invented the earth for people like you, and then salted it. please note: photo by jon.noj

The Surgeon by Alicia Suskin Ostriker I was still a kid interning at State he reminisces late in the meal— It was a young red-headed woman looked like my sister when the lines went flat I fell apart shook like a car with a broken axle Went to the head surgeon a fatherly man Boy, he said, you got to fill a graveyard before you know this business and you just did row one, plot one.

by Jim Harrison Late November (full moon last night), a cold Patagonia moon, the misty air tinkled slightly, a rank-smelling bull in the creek bottom seemed to be crying. Coyotes yelped up the canyon where they took a trip-wire photo of a jaguar last spring. I hope he's sleeping or eating a delicious deer. Our two little girl dogs are peeing in the midnight yard, nervous about the bull. They can't imagine a jaguar.

...happy, happy.

for wriggling my way into the attic to find the middle leaf for the dining room table and bring down the games for Thanksgiving. Our feast will be on Tuesday since Hubby and I are both working the holiday. The grrrrls will be home making the rounds with the grandmothers. Stop back for a comparative study of stuffings and cranberry sauces. I started cooking this afternoon. Sorry to say my dressing isn't up to its usual snuff. Used some fancy-schmancy sausage instead of the tried and true Jimmy Dean Bulk Pork Sausage. Let that be a lesson to anyone getting a little cocky and wanting to be innovative. Resist the urge. Save it for the leftovers. Very thankful for my new BFF, Hulu.com. Got to catch up on past episodes of The Good Wife . Made all the chopping go quite pleasantly, although now that I think about it, perhaps the problem with my dressing. Damn that vixen, Julianna. I have many things to be thankful for this year, the friendships and camaraderie I've found here among the...

XI. by Wendell Berry Though he was ill and in pain, in disobedience to the instruction he would have received if he had asked, the old man got up from his bed, dressed, and went to the barn. The bare branches of winter had emerged through the last leaf-colors of fall, the loveliest of all, browns and yellows delicate and nameless in the gray light and the sifting rain. He put feed in the troughs for eighteen ewe lambs, sent the dog for them, and she brought them. They came eager to their feed, and he who felt their hunger was by their feeding eased. From no place in the time of present places, within no boundary nameable in human thought, they had gathered once again, the shepherd, his sheep, and his dog with all the known and the unknown round about to the heavens' limit. Was this his stubbornness or bravado? No. Only an ordinary act of profoundest intimacy in a day that might have been better. Still the world persisted in its beauty, he in his gratitude, and for this he had most ...

by Gregory Djanikian You could think of sunlight Glancing off the minarets, You could think of guavas and figs And the whole marketplace filled With the sumptuous din of haggling, But you could not think of Alexandria Without the sea, or the sea, Turquoise and shimmering, without The white city rising before it. Even on the back streets You could feel it on your skin, You could smell it in the aroma Of dark coffee, spiced meat. You looked at the sea and you heard The wail of an Arab woman singing or praying. If, as I can now, you could point To the North Atlantic, swollen And dark as it often is, you might say, "Here lies Wrath," or "Truly God is great." You could season a Puritan soul by it. But you could fall into the Mediterranean As though you were falling into a blue dream, Gauzy, half unreal for its loveliness. It was deceptively calm and luxurious. At Stanley Bay, you could float On your back and watch the evening sun Color the city a faint rose. You could dr...

by Howard Nemerov Prig offered Pig the first chance at dessert, So Pig reached out and speared the bigger part. "Now that," cried Prig, "is extremely rude of you!" Pig, with his mouth full, said, "Wha, wha' wou' 'ou do?" "I would have taken the littler bit," said Prig. "Stop kvetching, then it's what you've got," said Pig. So virtue is its own reward, you see. And that is all it's ever going to be.

Grapefruit by Ted McMahon My grandfather got up early to section grapefruit. I know because I got up quietly to watch. He was tall. His hairless shins stuck out below his bathrobe, down to leather slippers. The house was quiet, sun just up, ticking of the grandfather clock tall in the corner. The grapefruit were always sectioned just so, nestled in clear nubbled bowls used for nothing else, with half a maraschino centered bleeding slowly into soft pale triangles of fruit. It was special grapefruit, Indian River, not to be had back home. Doves cooed outside and the last night-breeze rustled the palms against the eaves. He turned to see me, pale light flashing off his glasses and smiled. I remember as I work my knife along the membrane separating sections. It's dawn. The doves and palms are far away. I don't use cherries anymore. The clock is digital and no one is watching. Please note:Photo courtesy PDPhoto.org

Driving at Night by Sheila Packa Up north, the dashboard lights of the family car gleam in memory, the radio plays to itself as I drive my father plied the highways while my mother talked, she tried to hide that low lilt, that Finnish brogue, in the back seat, my sisters and I our eyes always tied to the Big Dipper I watch it still on summer evenings, as the fireflies stream above the ditches and moths smack into the windshield and the wildlife's red eyes bore out from the dark forests we flew by, then scattered like the last bit of star light years before. It's like a different country, the past we made wishes on unnamed falling stars that I've forgotten, that maybe were granted because I wished for love.