Nevertheless by Marianne Moore

you’ve seen a strawberry
that’s had a struggle; yet
was, where the fragments met,

a hedgehog or a star-
fish for the multitude
of seeds. What better food

than apple seeds; the fruit
within the fruit; locked in
like counter-curved twin

hazelnuts? Frost that kills
the little rubber-plant –
leaves of kok-sagyyz-stalks, can’t

harm the roots; they still grow
in frozen ground. Once where
there was a prickley-pear;

leaf clinging to a barbed wire,
a root shot down to grow
in earth two feet below;

as carrots from mandrakes
or a ram’s-horn root some-
times. Victory won’t come

to me unless I go
to it; a grape tendril
ties a knot in knots till

knotted thirty times; so
the bound twig that’s under-
gone and over-gone, can’t stir.

The weak overcomes its
menace, the strong over-
comes itself. What is there

like fortitude! What sap
went through that little thread
to make the cherry red!

End of the poem

15 random poems

 

Poetry by subject

Some external links:

The Bat’s Own Poetry Cave 

Talking Writing Monster.

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).

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