I am still in a poetry mood so I thought I would share one of my favorite Marge Piercy poems today. Back when my Bookman was working the bookstore he got a bunch of promotional postcards for National Poetry Month and one of them has the final stanza from the Piercy poem “The Art of Blessing the Day.” I have kept the postcard at my desk at work both at my previous and current jobs as a daily reminder.
The poem is longish and I don’t want to overstep copyright so I won’t post the whole thing. Each stanza talks about a blessing, the blessing for rain after drought, sun after rain, for a ripe peach, for the first garden tomato and a few other everyday sorts of occurrences that we take so much for granted. The last two stanzas of the poem are as follows:
But the discipline of blessings is to taste
each moment, the bitter, the sour, the sweet
and the salty, and be glad for what does not
hurt. The art is compressing attention
to each little and big blossom of the tree
of life, to let the tongue sing each fruit,
its savor, its aroma and its use.Attention is love, what we must give
children, mothers, fathers, pets,
our friends, the news, the woes of others.
What we want to change we curse and then
pick up a tool. Bless whatever you can
with eyes and hands and tongue. If you
can’t bless it, get ready to make it new.
I like this poem not only because it reminds me that blessings come daily in many forms, but also because it reminds me that if there is something that I don’t like it is my responsibility to do something about it. Complaining doesn’t fix anything so I had better be ready to pick up a tool and do something to contribute to a solution instead being part of the problem. The poem is a little shot of inspiration.
You can read the full poem in either What Are Big Girls Made Of? or The Art of Blessing the Day: Poems with a Jewish Theme both collections by Marge Piercy.
Do you have a poem you find particularly inspiring?
I love this and it’s just what I need to hear today when my mood is having a hard time staying afloat…
That is a wonderful poem! I need to look for it and put it in my journal as I think it goes along very well with my yoga goal of learning to be more mindful. Thank you Stefanie!
What poem do I find inspiring? I’m going to have to get back to you on that one because of course I can’t come up with a single one right now!
What a beautiful poem! I like the way it encourages the reader to be attentive to all of life’s elements, good and bad, and to accept them just as they are. The poems that give me a lift are the funny ones. I never fail to chuckle reading Anne Sexton’s rewrite of Cinderella where she describes her as a ‘dumb bunny’. I don’t know, that cheers me every time.
A friend introduced me to Marge Piercy’s novels some years ago and I love her fiction, but I hadn’t realised that she was a poet as well, although perhaps I should from the quality of her writing. I certainly don’t remember seeing any of her collections in local shops. This extract is superb, however, and so I’ll have to do some tracking down. Did you know that the Costa Award went to the poet Jill Shapcott, last night? That’s the second year running it has been given to the poet on the list. I’m really pleased.
Daphne, so glad you liked it and I hope it helped your day.
Iliana, glad you liked it. You might want to check out the whole collection in “The Art of Blessing the Day” as many of the poems are about mindfulness and being present.
Litlove, you like funny poems? I’ve got a Jane Kenyon poem I bet you will like. I think I will post it Wednesday. And I guess I haven’t read enough Anne Sexton because I didn’t realize she was funny.
Annie, oh yes, I think Piercy might have been a poet before she was a novelist. I love her prose but I think I enjoy her poems better. Hope you can find them. I have not heard of the Costa Award or Jill Shapcott. I have some investigating to do!
I like that excerpt–I should go find the whole poem and keep it at my desk as well. I really like Piercy’s fiction, I should try some of her poetry as I think I might just get on well with it, too.
It often depends of the mood I’m in, however I find W.S. Merwin ‘Something I Have Not Done’ strangely reassuring and that goes for this one too:
“Nothing Lasts”
“Nothing Lasts”-
how bitterly the thought attends each loss.
“Nothing Lasts”
a promise also of consolation.
Grief and Hope
the skipping rope’s two ends,
twin daughters of impatience.
One wears a dress of wool, the other cotton.
Jane Hirschfield Given Sugar, Given Salt
I’m growing to like Marge Piercy. I’m not reading my book of her poems very quickly, but picking it up now and then has been great.
Danielle, I like her prose too but I like her poetry even better. It is quite accessible and is often about gardening or her many cats.
Catharina, I like that one. Jane Hirschfield is good. I just disvered her through a few blogs a few years ago.
Dorothy, yay! I like to read poetry slowly too, only a few poems at a time. Poetry needs time to sink in a bit.
I haven’t read nearly as much poetry as I would like. I really need to focus more on that in 2011. I love your selection that you’ve shared with us!