Woman with Flower
Naomi Long Madgett
I wouldn’t coax the plant if I were you.
Such watchful nurturing may do it harm.
Let the soil rest from so much digging
And wait until it’s dry before you water it.
The leaf’s inclined to find its own direction;
Give it a chance to seek the sunlight for itself.
Much growth is stunted by too careful prodding,
Too eager tenderness.
The things we love we have to learn to leave alone.
The Oxford Anthology of African-American Poetry
Right from another website, only because a link might stop you from seeing why you should click on this awesomeness!!!
See below for more information on this awesome website, Brainpickings and how you can support it!!!
“The Ostrich and the Wizard, written by Kariuki Gakuo and illustrated by Sironka Averdung and John Okello, tells the prehistoric tale of young Earth and creatures first began to populate it.
The Ostrich, unsure of whether she was a bird or an animal, struggles with her quest for identity — heartened by laying a large white egg, she decides she’s a bird; but when the other birds realize she can’t fly, they ostracize her with scorn.
She runs and runs, unable to find where she belongs.
The ostrich ran faster and faster and the cloud of dust whirled thicker and thicker. The giant eyes of the crocodile were red and swollen with the dust, while the salty tears of the elephants and hippos formed great pools around their feet. In the hot sun the pools of tears dried up and formed deep salt licks.
But the ostrich did not stop running. Faster and faster she ran while behind her the cloud of dust whirled thicker and thicker.
Gorgeously illustrated and beautifully written, like all the stories and poems in the collection, it’s an allegory about the essence of home and belonging.
Complement Beneath the Rainbow with The Night Life of Trees and Waterlife — two equally wonderful children’s stories from another part of the world, based on traditional Indian mythology.”
From the researcher and writer:
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Looking at the clouds
blue in the ice-wind
space flows.
Thomas Grieg
No sky
no earth- even so
snowflakes fall.
Hashin
From: African Poems
We’re an Africanpeople
hard-softness burning black
the earth’s magic colour our veins.
an Africanpeople are we,
burning softly, softer.
Haki Madhubuti (Don L. Lee)
My Black Me
More about Don Lee you can read here!
From: My Black Me: A Beginning Book of Black Poetry (A Puffin Poetry Book)
NEW and USED: Abebooks.com My Black Me: A Beginning Book of Black Poetry
NEW at independent bookstores NEAR you: My Black Me.
“His work is characterized both by anger at
social and economic injustice and by
rejoicing in African-American culture.
His first six volumes of poetry were published in the 1960s. The verse collection Don’t Cry, Scream (1969) includes an introduction by poet Gwendolyn Brooks. Lee’s poetry readings were extremely popular during this time.”
UPDATE January 5. BUY book here: http://www.sfelectricworks.com/newsletter/newsletter-15.01.02.transient-sex.html. Contact: judith(at)sfelectricworks.com
From an email by Jason Tesauro:
• A Dutch publisher has been in touch and is going to publish a translation in the Netherlands. (Brent’s response, “holy shit, that’s my favorite country.”)
• Brent’s Transient Sex muse and lover, Toni Bernbaum, left a comment at poetryfoundation.com: “So, Jason. This is her.” (It’s worth reading the rest.)
• Requests for books from around the world continue to pour in.
• They have contacted NPR, This American Life and the Moth.
Am trying to get this volume! Excited!
SEE ABOVE CHANGE of point of sale. Update: Poet is private. Email his contact journalist Jason Tesauro to get a copy into your hands. A couple hundred books still in circulation: $25 (but global drawing attention so might be going relatively fast). jt@themoderngentleman.com
Update 2: Ordered book. More poems soon.
Some quotes through Jason Tesauro http://www.poetryfoundation.org/article/249708#article
—“Sex With J.C. Knight”
“But when I got there he said, I just play
the piano and eat MDMA four times a day.
But I’ve been tapping into Indian spirits
who knew the earth before she hurt.”
—“Sex With Genevieve Bujold”
It was a dimestore revelation:
Tell her you’re a poet,
not a housepainter
[…]
— from another poem
“She was off to be a star again.
I was off to paint the Wagner’s house
Monterey gray with dark blue trim.”
Returning from Sigiriya hills
in their high green the grey
animal fortress rock claws of stone
rumors of wild boar
pass
paddy terraces
bullocks brown men
who rise knee deep like the earth
out of the earth…”
Sunlight sunlight
Awesome poetry from all over. 