reverie v. reality

• hello polly: help, I’m the loneliest person in the world! by heather havrilesky

The cage is open. You can walk out anytime you want. Why are you still in there?

• how to avoid half-heartedness by bookbear express

What I write is all mine, it’s a living thing, it’s an extension of me that wanders out into the world.

• a sad child by margaret atwood

none of us is;
or else we all are.

• (new) this isn't the life by faith arkorful

[…] I suffer, yes. Yes, I suffer. And I still
love nothing like I love myself. My life, stained orange like the tangerines.
I feed the dog. I accept this living, let a slice dissolve one my tongue,
hold both the acid and sweetness.

• (new) the thing is by ellen bass

Then you hold life like a face
between your palms, a plain face,
no charming smile, no violet eyes,
and you say, yes, I will take you
I will love you, again.

• the bridge by gabrielle bates

If I describe something, anything, long enough,
language will lead me back to wanting it.

• what resembles the grave but isn't by anne boyer

getting out of that hole, falling into another one; sometimes falling into a hole within a hole, or many holes within holes, getting out of them one after the other, then falling again, saying “this is not your grave, get out of the hole”; sometimes being pushed, saying “you can not push me into this hole, it is not my grave,” and getting out defiantly, then falling into a hole again without any pushing; sometimes falling into a set of holes whose structures are predictable, ideological, and long dug, often falling into this set of structural and impersonal holes

• (new) rain by raymond carver

Would I live my life over again?
Make the same unforgivable mistakes?
Yes, given half a chance. Yes.

• miss you. would like to take a walk with you. by gabrielle calvocoressi

You always believed me. Wish you would
come back so we could talk about truth.
Miss you. Wish you would walk through my
door. Stare out from the mirror. Come through
the pipes.

• god, gods, powers, lord, universe by chen chen

I just need to lose
a little
less quickly.

• apology with interruptions by rita dove

I forgot. That’s how
everything goes now,
all of the time.

• (new) little red cap by carol ann duffy

Out of the forest I come with my flowers, singing, all alone.

• the love song of j. alfred prufrock by t.s. eliot

Do I dare
Disturb the universe?

• aubade at bosque redondo by carrie fountain

[…] We’re still bound
to go on having this hunch

everything has left us or is waiting
for the worst possible moment to do so.

• october by louise glück

you are not alone,
the poem said,
in the dark tunnel.

• after my brother’s death, i reflect on the iliad by elisa gonzalez

But it’s not like that, is it? Not at all. When in this world, similes carry us nowhere.

• (new) "i lock you in an american sonnet that is part prison" by terrance hayes

I lock you in a form that is part music box, part meat
Grinder to separate the song of the bird from the bone.
I lock your persona in a dream-inducing sleeper hold
While your better selves watch from the bleachers.

• waiting by hua xi

The centuries watch
as we walk off
the sheer cliff of them.

My eyes adjust to the dark,
but my heart never.

• death comes to me again, a girl by dorianne laux

There are wind chimes
and the smell of lemons, some days
it rains, but more often the air is dry
and sweet.

• dogfish by mary oliver

Mostly, I want to be kind.

• iii. movement of bodies by henry reed

Are you ready? Is everyone paying attention?
Very well then. Here are two hills.

• finally, some concrete career advice by natalie shapero

I didn’t know a dream
could undo a true event, uncement it,
but it did — from then on, I hadn’t gone, and how
do I live with myself now, I ask each day —

• staying by ali shapiro

[…] If there’s a ring around the stone
inside your pocket, if you’re very
very quiet, if you promise
to be lucky, if you’re good
enough.

• ash by tracy k. smith

House with hands. House of guilt. House

That other houses built. House of lies

And pride and bone. House afraid to be alone.

• coping by alison thumel

The way I can write the shape of the
thing but not the thing itself.

• tomorrow is a place by sanna wani

There, in the ground, there is our memory. I am near enough my roots.

• john wick is so tired by kyra wilder

wait, look now, John Wick is riding
the black horse like he knows just what grief is
like he knows sometimes it’s killing and killing and
sometimes it’s just slipping in your shoes and
I want you to be here and

• the second coming by w.b. yeats

That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

• bookshop dot org — buy books online & have some of the proceeds go back to local bookstores!

• cloudhiker dot net — i miss stumbleupon, okay?

• futureme dot org — send a letter (e-mail) to your future self

• listography — website where you make lists and follow other people's lists, which is like heaven to me

• palette poetry's poetry we admire — collections of poems by theme

• pen america’s banned book index — index for 2023 - 2024

• thriftbooks dot com — new and used books