My friend, Bob, sent me a poem today....... I'm posting the last stanza.
This earth will grow cold,
a star among stars
and one of the smallest,
a gilded mote on blue velvet-
I mean this, our great earth.
This earth will grow cold one day,
not like a block of ice
or a dead cloud even
but like an empty walnut it will roll along
in pitch-black space ...
You must grieve for this right now
-you have to feel this sorrow now-
for the world must be loved this much
if you're going to say ``I lived'' ...
Nazim Hikmet
February, 1948
Trans. Randy Blasing and Mutlu Konuk - 1993
5 comments:
I added your latest book to my reading list. Thanks!
I heard about yor first book through Steve Elliott.
Right now I'm reading Horsemen of the Esopagus, about professional eaters cause a friend of mine recommended it and she was in the cake eating contest last year competing against William Perry and totally kicked his ass! :)
Thanks for dropping a note, I added your blog in my blog links, and will definetly give your newest onea read!
oh yeah - is there a place where you list your book tour stops?
Hi Alison, you do know me pretty well, but I'm no blogger and don't want my address out here. I do yoga pretty much daily, each morning early for maybe 40 minutes, including work on breath. It always feels very good, and then it's over. I was struck by your reference to Nazim Hikmet, one of my favorite communist poets (the others are Neruda, Brecht, & McGrath). Let me copy out here, in closing, a fine little poem of NH's:
OPTIMISM
I write poems
they don't get published
but they will
I'm waiting for a letter with good news
mayabe it will arrive the day I die
but it will come for sure
the world's not run by governments or money
but people rule
a hundred years from now
maybe
but it will be for sure
Best, R.
chicago sheri,
Steve Elliott is a sweetheart. Tell me when his new book comes out.......and tell me what you think of Twenty Questions.
ps I always wondered about people who entered eating contests.
OK R, I know yogis and I know communists, but who are you? If I had a vin diagram of the two categories.......
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