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Thursday, April 18, 2013

For National Poetry Month: "Some Trees," by John Ashbery

Poem_in_your_pocket


April is National Poetry Month. And today – April 18 – is “Poem In Your Pocket” day. Today’s the day to carry your favorite poem with you, and give it to people, and let people know.

 

 

I don’t have a single favorite poem. It depends on my mood, which is sometimes a little somber. But it’s April, so let’s have a brighter one today – a very early one by John Ashbery:

 

 

 

Some Trees

 

These are amazing: each 
Joining a neighbor, as though speech 
Were a still performance. 
Arranging by chance

 

To meet as far this morning 
From the world as agreeing 
With it, you and I 
Are suddenly what the trees try

 

To tell us we are: 
That their merely being there 
Means something; that soon 
We may touch, love, explain.

 

And glad not to have invented 
Such comeliness, we are surrounded: 
A silence already filled with noises, 
A canvas on which emerges

 

A chorus of smiles, a winter morning. 
Placed in a puzzling light, and moving, 
Our days put on such reticence 
These accents seem their own defense.


 

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