The people I love the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half-submerged balls.
I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.
I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.
The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.
End of the poem
15 random poems
- Hymn To Adversity by Thomas Gray
- Wish by W. S. Merwin
- Full Moon by Tu Fu
- Cruel Kindness by Rabindranath Tagore
- The Holy Tree
- On Being Challenged to Write an Epigram in the Manner of Herrick by Sir Walter Raleigh
- The Snowy Spring Is Raging Mad poem – Aleksandr Blok poems | Poetry Monster
- Two Travellers in the Place Vendome poem – Amy Lowell poems | Poems and Poetry
- Free Love by Rabindranath Tagore
- Olney Hymn 52: For The Poor by William Cowper
- Владимир Бенедиктов – Человек
- Sappho to Phaon (Ovid Heroid XV) poem – Alexander Pope
- La Vita Nuova by Weldon Kees
- Finisterre by Sylvia Plath
- The First Part: Sonnet 5 – How that vast heaven intitled First is roll’d, by William Drummond
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).
