Dear readers,
Welcome to my eighth round of daily postings for National Poetry Month. This past year, when so much of this fractured world filled me with bewilderment and sorrow and anger, I found myself turning to poetry more than ever before. It was through poems that I encountered some of the most beautiful expressions of the human experience we share, and through poems that I grasped so palpably all the forces that push and break us apart.
And it was through poems that I learned and re-learned to worship the strangers around me. Let us begin this month with the phenomenal writer and activist June Jordan (1936-2002), whose mountain of work I urge you to explore.
For the next 30 days, I hope the lines of these poets will reach you, wherever you are, whoever you are. Are you ready? Join me.
“These Poems”
These poems
they are things that I do
in the dark
reaching for you
whoever you are
and
are you ready?
These words
they are stones in the water
running away
These skeletal lines
they are desperate arms for my longing and love.
I am a stranger
learning to worship the strangers
around me
whoever you are
whoever I may become.
live in the layers 