Mercy, we are in the midst of a storm.
Weekly hurricanes, and the market takes a terrible crash.
Political emails fall and pile up like a blizzard of snow.
The news sounds like one long weather report of natural and unnatural disaster.
And still, somehow, we’re supposed to carry on, reading and writing and eating.
Sending our children to school.
Brushing the dog.
We pay a bill and write a thank you note and unload the dishwasher.
It is amazing what we people will do in the face of it all.
The word ‘survive’ doesn’t begin to do it justice, do you think?
It’s really more like thriving.
Most days, most people will laugh at a joke or help someone move a heavy piece of furniture or give or receive a kiss.
It is amazing to me what we people will do in the face of it all.
Of Politics & Art
By Norman Dubie
Here, on the farthest point of the peninsula
The winter storm
Off the Atlantic shook the schoolhouse.
Mrs. Whitimore, dying
Of tuberculosis, said it would be after dark
Before the snowplow and bus would reach us.
She read to us from Melville.
(Read the rest right here. Really. Do. It’s very good.)
Of Politics and Art
Elaine M.
That’s a great selection for Poetry Friday–and a fine post for the political and economic times in which we find ourselves today, Liz!
Liz, how do you always find the perfect poem for your Poetry Friday thoughts? I like this one, and I’ve never seen it before. Somehow, it made me think of “The Grapes of Wrath” (oh the strong women in that one!), which I’ve been wanting to re-read lately.
Thanks,
Jules
7-Imp
TadMack says: 🙂
Wow, Liz. This one is just …beautiful. The right poem at the right moment.
May you have peace in the midst of the storm.
thank you
from a storm-weary, melville-reading (truly!), dishwasher-unloader.
-annette
Wow. What a powerful poem.
Thanks, Elaine, Jules, Tadmack, Annette and Kelly. Glad it spoke to you…
I’m just having a moment of eerie resonance — a “me, too” moment. I just posted about my Ohio experience with Hurricane Ike. Then I came here and it was like looking in the mirror. Great poem. Thanks. And my heart goes out to you and all the others who were in the more direct path. Both times.
We were really only affected by evacuees, not weather. My heart goes out, too….
Oh, it *is* good. Thanks, Liz.
Thank you, too!
Oh, lovely. And I’m reading Life as We Knew It, a terrific novel about what we do when the world may or may not be ending. Thanks for sharing this poem!
Ooo, I’ll see if I can find that book!