National Poetry Week: When Words Take Flight

is done in a circle.  The sky is round,
and I have heard that the earth is round
like a ball, and so are all the stars.
The wind, in its greatest power, whirls.

For theirs is the same religion as ours.

in a circle.  The moon does the same,
And both are round. Even the seasons
form a great circle in their changing,
and always come back again to where they were.

and so it is in everything where power moves.

but she saw diapers steaming on the line,
a doll slumped behind the door.
So she lugged a chair behind the garage to sit out the children's naps.

the pinched armor of a vanished cricket,
a floating maple leaf.  Other days
she stared until she was assured
when she closed her eyes
she'd see only her own vivid blood.

pouting from the top of the stairs.
And just what was mother doing
out back with the field mice? Why,

that night when Thomas rolled over and
lurched into her, she would open her eyes
and think of the place that was hers
for an hour -- where
she was nothing,
pure nothing, in the middle of the day.

And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I --
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
It's had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor --
Bare.
But all the time
I'se been a-climbin' on,
And reachin' landin's,
And turnin' corners,
And sometimes goin' in the dark
Where there ain't been no light.
So boy, don't you turn back.
Don't you set down on the steps
‘Cause you finds it's kinder hard.
Don't you fall now --
For I'se still goin', honey,
I'se still climbin,'
And life for me ain't been no crystal stair.

Dearer than words on paper, shall depart,
And be no more the warder of my heart,
Whereof again myself shall hold the key;
And bed no more -- what now you seem to be --
The sun, from which all excellences start
In a round nimbus, nor a broken dart
Of moonlight, even, splintered on the sea;
I shall remember only of this hour --
And weep somewhat, as now you see me weep --
The pathos of your love, that, like a flower,
Fearful of death yet amorous of sleep,
Droops for a moment and beholds, dismayed,
The wind whereon its petals shall be laid.