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Woodworking at the End of the World ~Ocean Vuong

30/4/2022

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In a field, after everything, a streetlamp
shining on a patch of grass.

Having just come back to life, I lay down under its warmth
& waited for a way.

That’s when the boy appeared, lying next to me.
He was wearing a Ninja Turtles t-shirt
from another era, the colors faraway.

I recognized his eyes: black buttons salvaged from the coat
I used to cover my mother’s face, at the end.

Why do you exist? I wanted to know.
I felt the crickets around us but couldn’t hear them.

A chapel on the last day of war.

That’s how quiet he was.

The town I had walked from was small & American.

If I stayed on my knees, it would keep all my secrets.

When we heard the woodcutters coming closer, destroying
the past to build the future, the boy started to cry.

But the voice, the voice that came out
was an old man’s.

I reached into my pocket
but the gun was gone.

I must’ve dropped it while burying my language
farther up the road.

It’s okay, the boy said at last. I forgive you.

Then he kissed me as if returning a porcelain shard
to my cheek.

Shaking, I turned to him. I turned
& found, crumpled on the grass, the faded red shirt.

I put it over my face & stayed very still—like my mother
at the end.

Then it came to me, my life. I remembered my life
the way an ax handle, mid-swing, remembers the tree.

& I was free.
​__________________________

Excerpt From Time Is a Mother
Picture
Photo by Abby Savage on Unsplash
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Still I Rise ~Maya Angelou

29/4/2022

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You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
’Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops,
Weakened by my soulful cries?

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
’Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin’ in my own backyard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
Up from a past that’s rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

Picture
Photo by Kunj Parekh on Unsplash
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Frequently Asked Questions to an Iraqi Refugee ~Ahmed M. Badr

28/4/2022

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 Is Osama bin Laden your cousin?

No. But I have a cousin named Osama. You should get to know him — he loves Americans and their questions.

You're from Iran right? Or is it Iraq? I always get them mixed up.

Let me make it easier for you.

Think weapons of mass destruction. Think George Bush.
Think lies.
Think war on terror.
Sorry.
War of terror.

How did you survive the war? It must have been so hard for you and your family, living under such a brutal dictator.

Sometimes I forget who was brutal. I forget whose side brutal was on. Brutal kept showing his face on the news, so I assumed he had friends on both sides.

You must have so many stories! Did you talk about any of them in your college essay? Oh my God, you would get in everywhere!

Actually, you know the Common Application, where you go to apply for college? You can attach files to your submission. I tried to upload some weapons of mass destruction, but for some reason I just couldn't find any.

Do you consider yourself Iraqi-American?

It's a label I struggle with. Some days I wake up not knowing whether I'm the conquered or the conquerer. In 2003, a rifle was pointed at me. In 2008, we moved to American, and suddenly I was the one holding it.

This time I was pointing the rifle at my old identity, asking it why it always mispronounced English, why it thought there was a difference between freedom and democracy, asking it whether it thought Arabic was written from right to left to confuse the West, and asking it if the Mississippi had ever heard of the Euphrates.

In an interview with CBS News on September 12, 1996, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was asked the following question:
"We have heard that half a million children have died [in Iraq]. . . . Is the price worth it?"
She replied, "We think the price is worth it."

I recently found out that Secretary Albright teaches at Georgetown. I was rejected from Georgetown. My application essay was 500 words long, but I wanted to write 500,000.

Growing up Mama always told me, el maerof yergos iegol al gaa oja. "Those who can't dance always say the ground is crooked."

Mama, it's hard to dance because the ground has 500,000 cracks whispering under my feet.

They're telling me their names, ages, stories, and asking just how many cracks a medal is worth.
Picture
Photo by Ramin Khatibi on Unsplash
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It's Not a Terrible Thing ~Jasmin Kaur

27/4/2022

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to be alone
when you have
at the very least

yourself

but i didn’t.
but i didn’t.
i’d never even
spoken to
that girl.
Picture
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What I told the Doctor ~Sabrina Benaim

26/4/2022

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​the eyes are not reliable.
not windows. not mirrors.

my ears have eroded,
leaving two broken telephones.

my hands have embraced what they always have been;
two grasping panics, two torches to everything i love.

feet - nothing more than two rocks some days.
​
& my heart has developed a kind of amnesia,
where it remembers everything but itself.
Picture
Photo by Stefano Pollio on Unsplash
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I Meant To Do My Work Today ~Richard Le Galliene

25/4/2022

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I meant to do my work today,
But a brown bird sang in the apple tree,
And a butterfly flitted across the field,
And all the leaves were calling me.
And the wind went sighing over the land,
Tossing the grasses to and fro,
And a rainbow held out its shining hand--
So what could I do, but laugh and go?
Picture
Photo by Ryk Naves on Unsplash
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Sonnet 116 ~William Shakespeare

24/4/2022

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Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wand'ring bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
          If this be error and upon me prov'd,
          I never writ, nor no man ever lov'd.
Picture
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash
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A World of Dew ~Kobayashi Issa

23/4/2022

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PicturePhoto by Aaron Burden on Unsplash
​




​A world of dew,
And within every dewdrop
A world of struggle.


~Kobayashi Issa

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FROM GITANJALI ~Rabindranath Tagore

21/4/2022

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Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection:
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action--
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.
Picture
Photo by Alexander Schimmeck on Unsplash

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Traveler, There is No Road ~Antonio Machado

20/4/2022

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PicturePhoto by Nick Fewings on Unsplash
Caminante, son tus huellas
el camino y nada más;
Caminante, no hay camino,
se hace camino al andar.
Al andar se hace el camino,
y al volver la vista atrás
se ve la senda que nunca
se ha de volver a pisar.
Caminante, no hay camino
sino estelas en la mar.


Traveler, your footprints
are the only road, nothing else.
Traveler, there is no road;
you make your own path as you walk.
As you walk, you make your own road,
and when you look back
you see the path
you will never travel again.
Traveler, there is no road;
only a ship's wake on the sea.

translated by Mary G. Berg and Dennis Maloney

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Breeze ~Michael Ondaatje

18/4/2022

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Picture
For BP Nichol
___________________

Nowadays I listen only to duets.
Johnny Hodges and The Bean, a thin slip
of piano behind them
on this page on this stage
craft a breeze in a horn.

One friends sits back and listens
to the other. Nowadays
I want only the wild and tender 
phrasing of "NightHawk,"
its air groaned out 
like the breath of a lover.
Rashomon by Saxophone.

So brother and sister woke, miles apart,
in those 19th century novels you loved,
with the same wound or desire.

We sit down to clean and sharpen
the other's most personal lines
—a proposal of more, a waving dismissal
of whole stanzas — in Lethbridge in Edmonton
you stood with the breeze
in an uncomfortable Chinese restaurant
in Camrose, getting a second cup
at The Second Cup near Spadina.

I almost called you this morning
for a phone number.
Records I haven't yet returned.
Tapes you were supposed to make for me.

And across the country
tears about your death.
I always thought, someone says, 
he was very good for you.
Though I still like, Barrie,
the friends who are not good for me.

Along the highway
only the duets and wind fill up my car.
I saw the scar of the jet that Sunday
trying to get you out of the sky.
Ben Webster, Coleman Hawkings.
An A and an H, a bean and a breeze.

All these twin truths

There is bright sumac, once more,
this September, along the Bayview Extension.

From now on
no more solos

I tie you to me
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Rilke's Book of Hours 1,9

17/4/2022

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Picture
Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash
I read it hear in your very word,
in the story of the gestures
with which your hands cupped themselves
around our becoming — limiting, warm.

You said live out loud, and die you said lightly,
and over and over again you said be.

But before the first death came murder.
A fracture broke across the rings you'd ripened.
A screaming shattered the voices

that had just come together to speak you,
to make of you a bridge
over the chasm of everything.

And what they have stammered ever since
are fragments
of your ancient name.

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If There Were No Emptiness ~Margaret Atwood

16/4/2022

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PicturePhoto by Josè Maria Sava on Unsplash
If there were no emptiness, there would be no life.
Think about it.
All those electrons, particles, and whatnot
crammed in next to each other like junk in an attic,
like trash in a compactor
smashed together in a flat block
so there’s nothing but plasma:
no you no me.


Therefore I praise vacancy.
Vacant lots with their blowing plastics and teasels,
vacant houses, their furze of dust,
vacant stares, blue as the sky through windows.
Motels with the word Vacancy
flashing outside, a red neon arrow pointing,


pointing at the path to be taken
to the bored front desk, to the key-shaped key
on the dangling brown leather key holder,


the key that opens the vacant room
with its scored linoleum floor a blear-eyed yellow
its flowery couch and wilted cushions
its swaybacked bed, smelling of bleach and mildew
its stuttering radio
its ashtray that was here
seventy years ago.


That room has been static for me so long:
an emptiness a void a silence
containing an unheard story
ready for me to unlock.
​

Let there be plot.

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Que Syria Syria ~Ken Babstock

15/4/2022

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Picture
Photo by Chris Knight on Unsplash
Slide whiste and shit bucket. We'll do 
our own rendition. Convictions, like haircuts,
hold true until the morning they don't.
I'll be proved wrong down the road --
not far down the road, mind you;
likely just past the next gum coin,
before that streetlight retrofitted
to look more lampish. Why are disarticulated
feet washing ashore in their Nike carapaces
like hermit crabs adjusting to habitat loss?
The North Pacific Gyre spits out basketballs,
pen caps, rat-tail combs for the well-behaved
and habitually cagey. Kids, eh? I could have
taken prisoners but lack administrative skills,
all those numbers followed by letters followed
by answering to Amnesty and ghosts
bringing in ghosts that exit as corpses.
I have my suspicions. It's just I doubt their validity.
I take my legs off above the knee, lean
both against the armoire, and slide in Chopin
while tomorrow balls up its tinfoil and begins to chew.
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My Body is a Vessel ~ Grace Lau

14/4/2022

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PicturePhoto by Todd Trapani on Unsplash
My Body Is a Vessel
      ~after Mary Oliver
______________

for the sun
and a home
for the salt
air, buried in concrete
and dust, and risen
again --
as if my skin remembers
its spring song, no longer
a young and dying thing
but at last,
winged. Bring my body
back to slow rivers.
What's the word
for flock
of little joys?

I think it was
blessing.

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Acts of Kindness ~ Faraway

13/4/2022

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Picturephoto by Prateek Gautam on Unsplash
Kindness becomes
more apparent
in dark times,
kind of like
how our hearts
seem louder,
more alive,
in quiet places.

         — acts of kindness as a source of light

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The Road Not Taken

12/4/2022

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Today is my dad's 70th birthday. This is one of his favourite poems. Happy birthday daD! — Love, neJ

PicturePhoto by Andreas Dress on Unsplash
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
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;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
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,

And both that morning equally lay
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.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
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.

~Robert Frost

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The Guest House ~ Rumi

11/4/2022

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Picture
Photo by Redd on Unsplash
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honourably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī
Translated by Coleman Barks
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Coyote Goes to the Doctor - Thomas King

10/4/2022

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Picture
This is a series of poems by Thomas King, Canadian writer and photographer, of Cherokee and Greek descent. This is from his first collection of poetry, 77 Fragments of a Familiar Ruin.

I'm not going to record myself reading these. I'm not First Nation, and this is not my story to tell. But I'm presenting it here because I think it's important for others to read.

The coyote is often found in First Nations storytelling. He is the trickster, and uses humour and deception to rebel against social conventions.


6.

Coyote goes to the doctor
   to get tested.

You have Adverse Childhood Experiences,
   says the doctor.

That would explain why I'm so mischievous,
   says Coyote.
That would explain why I don't learn quickly.
That would explain why I can't control my emotions.
That would explain why I mess up the world.

That will be three hundred and thirty dollars,
   says the doctor.

That would explain why I won't pay you,
​   says Coyote.
I've had Adverse Childhood Experiences,
   Coyote tells all his friends.

Can they be cured? says Beaver.

Can they be treated? says Bear.

Let's hope you won't be like this
   for the rest of your life, says Turtle.

I'm sure Social Services will be able to help me,
   says Coyote.

All the animals laugh and agree
   that this is one of Coyote's better jokes.

25.

Coyote goes to the doctor
   to get tested.

You don't have Adverse Childhood Experiences,
   says the doctor.
​You're just spirited.

​That would explain why I'm so mischievous,
   says Coyote.
That would explain why I don't learn quickly.
That would explain why I can't control my emotions.
That would explain why I mess up the world.

That will be three hundred and thirty dollars,
   says the doctor.

That's the spirit, says Coyote.
I'm spirited,
   Coyote tells all his friends.

You certainly are, says Beaver.

Want to hear me shout? says Coyote.

Maybe you could be a little less spirited, says Bear.

Want to watch me bang my head against a wall?
   says Coyote.

You don't want to be like this the rest of your life,
   says Turtle.

Yes, I do, says Coyote. Yesidoyesidoyesido.

The animals draw straws to see who gets
   to call Social Services.

48.

Coyote goes to the doctor
   to get tested.

There's nothing wrong with you,
   says the doctor.
You're just a total ____ up.

​That would explain why I'm so mischievous,
   says Coyote.
That would explain why I don't learn quickly.
That would explain why I can't control my emotions.
That would explain why I mess up the world.

That will be three hundred and thirty dollars,
   says the doctor.

​____ off, says Coyote.
I'm a total ____ up,
   Coyote tells his friends.

You're not that bad, says Beaver.

____ you, says Coyote.

And you're our friend, says Bear.

____ you too, says Coyote.

We just want you to be happy, says Turtle.

And ____ Social Services, says Coyote.

All the animals agree that
   the professionals at Social Services
​   will be able to fill in the blanks.

60.

Coyote goes to the doctor
   to get tested.

Your problem,
   says the doctor,
   is that no one likes you.

​That would explain why I'm so mischievous,
   says Coyote.
That would explain why I don't learn quickly.
That would explain why I can't control my emotions.
That would explain why I mess up the world.

That will be three hundred and thirty dollars,
   says the doctor.

​That would explain why I don't like myself.
No one likes me,
   Coyote tells all his friends.

I like you, says Beaver.

Do you like me when I yell at you?

I like you, says Bear.

Do you like me when I hit you?

I like you says Turtle.

I'm going to jump into the ocean,
   says Coyote,
   sink to the bottom
   and never come up.

The animals call Social Services,
   where the wait time is longer than usual
   due to increased volume.

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The Waking

9/4/2022

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PicturePhoto by Annie Spratt on Unsplash
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.
I learn by going where I have to go.

We think by feeling. What is there to know?
I hear my being dance from ear to ear.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
​
Of those so close beside me, which are you?
God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,
And learn by going where I have to go.

Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?
The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Great Nature has another thing to do
To you and me; so take the lively air,
And, lovely, learn by going where to go.

This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
What falls away is always. And is near.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I learn by going where I have to go.

~Theodore Roethke

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    Jennifer

    You can find some short thoughts here, some personal moments, and other nuggets. I hope you'll join me on The Journey.
    ​
    *April is National Poetry Month, so along with some other posts, there is a poem every day here.

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​Jennifer Snowdon  ©2022   ✉️ ​breathe@jennifersnowdon.ca​
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