won't you celebrate with me by Lucille Clifton

-




won't you celebrate with me


what i have shaped into


a kind of life? i had no model.


born in babylon


both nonwhite and woman


what did i see to be except myself?


i made it up


here on this bridge between


starshine and clay,


my one hand; come celebrate


with me that everyday


something has tried to kill me


and has failed.

Comments

Post a Comment

Hey, thanks for your thoughts and your time:>)

Popular posts from this blog

The Return of Odysseus

-
Image
by George Bilgere When Odysseus finally does get home he is understandably upset about the suitors, who have been mooching off his wife for twenty years, drinking his wine, eating his mutton, etc. In a similar situation today he would seek legal counsel. But those were different times. With the help of his son Telemachus he slaughters roughly one hundred and ten suitors and quite a number of young ladies, although in view of their behavior I use the term loosely. Rivers of blood course across the palace floor. I too have come home in a bad mood. Yesterday, for instance, after the department meeting, when I ended up losing my choice parking spot behind the library to the new provost. I slammed the door. I threw down my book bag in this particular way I have perfected over the years that lets my wife understand the contempt I have for my enemies, which is prodigious. And then with great skill she built a gin and tonic that would have pleased the very gods, and with epic patience she list...
Read more

The Poet Goes to Indiana by Mary Oliver

-
Image
I'll tell you a half-dozen things that happened to me in Indiana when I went that far west to teach. You tell me if it was worth it. I lived in the country with my dog— part of the bargain of coming. And there was a pond with fish from, I think, China. I felt them sometimes against my feet. Also, they crept out of the pond, along its edges, to eat the grass. I'm not lying. And I saw coyotes, two of them, at dawn, running over the seemingly unenclosed fields. And once a deer, but a buck, thick-necked, leaped into the road just-oh, I mean just, in front of my car— and we both made it home safe. And once the blacksmith came to care for the four horses, or the three horses that belonged to the owner of the house, and I bargained with him, if I could catch the fourth, he, too, would have hooves trimmed for the Indiana winter, and apples did it, and a rope over the neck did it, so I won something wonderful; and there was, one morning, an owl flying, oh pale angel, into the hay loft o...
Read more

TGIF

-
Image
The Elusive Something by Charles Simic Was it in the smell of freshly baked bread That came out to meet me in the street? The face of a girl carrying a white dress From the cleaners with her eyes half closed? The sight of a building blackened by fire Where once I went to look for work? The toothless old man passing out leaflets For a clothing store going out of business? Or was it the woman pushing a baby carriage About to turn the corner? I ran after, As if the little one lying in it was known to me, And found myself alone on a busy street I didn't recognize, feeling like someone Out for the first time after a long illness, Who sees the world with his heart, Then hurries home to forget how it felt. please note: art by Amanda Cass
Read more