Making Light Of It
by Philip Levine
I call out a secret name, the name
of the angel who guards my sleep,
and light grows in the east, a new light
like no other, as soft as the petals
of the blown rose in late summer.
Yes, it is late summer in the West.
Even the grasses climbing the Sierras
reach for the next outcropping of rock
with tough, burned fingers. The thistle
sheds its royal robes and quivers
awake in the hot winds off the sun.
A cloudless sky fills my room, the room
I was born in and where my father sleeps
his long dark sleep guarding the name
he shared with me. I can follow the day
to the black rags and corners it will
scatter to because someone always
goes ahead burning the little candle
of his breath, making light of it all.
End of the poem
15 random poems
- Владимир Маяковский – Рабочий корреспондент
- Twiddle-de-dee by Muralidharan Mudaliar
- Константин Бальмонт – Эльзи
- Владимир Маяковский – Глупая история
- Cholera Camp by Rudyard Kipling
- At The Locks Of The Void
- Fortune poem – Zora Bernice May Cross poems
- Валерий Брюсов – In hас lackimarum valle (в этой долине слез )
- Владимир Высоцкий – Не бывает кораблей без названия
- Canto XIII poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Владимир Бенедиктов – Я знаю, люблю я бесплодно
- Come Into the Garde, Maud poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems
- Владимир Высоцкий – Мне скулы от досады сводит
- Hug O’War by Shel Silverstein
- A Ritual To Read To Each Other by William Stafford
Some external links:
Duckduckgo.com – the alternative in the US
Quant.com – a search engine from France, and also an alternative, at least for Europe
Yandex – the Russian search engine (it’s probably the best search engine for image searches).
Philip Levine ( 1928 – 2015) was an American poet best known for his poems about working-class Detroit. He taught for more than thirty years in the English department of California State University, Fresno and held teaching positions at other universities as well. He served on the Board of Chancellors of the Academy of American Poets from 2000 to 2006, and was appointed Poet Laureate of the United States for 2011–2012