Since I'm giving away a little poetry by the stunning, brilliant and feisty Nina Romano and a little $5 Starbucks gift card to enjoy with her work, I've got poetry on the brain.
(Don't forget--all you need to do to enter to win Coffeehouse Meditations and the $5 Starbucks card is leave a comment by Saturday!)
I treat poetry like seasoning as a reader--enough to spice things up, but too much makes me lose my taste. Garrison Keillor gives me a nice daily dose on The Writer's Almanac, though he could read the phone book and I'd sit listening with rapt attention. I'll indulge you today with two of my favorite poems and poets. The first I read as a schoolkid and I'm still struck by the direct way Gwendolyn Brooks describes these people--it's brief and haunting. The second is merely one of many brilliant poems by Pablo Neruda who I have loved for twenty years and if you've not yet watched Il Postino, you're missing out on cinematic awesomeness.
| The Bean Eaters | |
| by Gwendolyn Brooks |
|
They eat beans mostly, this old yellow pair.
Dinner is a casual affair.
Plain chipware on a plain and creaking wood,
Tin flatware.
Two who are Mostly Good.
Two who have lived their day,
But keep on putting on their clothes
And putting things away.
And remembering . . .
Remembering, with twinklings and twinges,
As they lean over the beans in their rented back room that
is full of beads and receipts and dolls and cloths,
tobacco crumbs, vases and fringes.
| The Book of Questions, III | | by Pablo Neruda
Translated by William O'Daly |
| III.
Tell me, is the rose naked
or is that her only dress?
Why do trees conceal
the splendor of their roots?
Who hears the regrets
of the thieving automobile?
Is there anything in the world sadder
than a train standing in the rain |
|
Spill it, reader, who's your favorite poet?
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