Five More Minutes With Poem: Messenger

Written by Braiden Rex-Johnson on August 23, 2012

This poem was written by Mary Oliver, a National Book Award- and Pulitzer Prize-winning poet whose work we have featured not once, but twice before on the Five More Minutes With website.

Here is her poem, “Messenger,” for your enjoyment.

My work is loving the world.

Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird —

equal seekers of sweetness.

Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.

Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.

Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?

Am I no longer young, and still not half-perfect? Let me

keep my mind on what matters,

which is my work,

which is mostly standing still and learning to be

astonished.

The phoebe, the delphinium.

The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.

Which is mostly rejoicing, since all ingredients are here,

which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart

and these body-clothes,

a mouth with which to give shouts of joy

to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,

telling them all, over and over, how it is

that we live forever.

 

More stories from: Featured Poem,Featured Story

Anne Sexton Poem: Welcome Morning

Written by Anne Sexton, Poet on April 30, 2012

WELCOME MORNING

There is joy

in all:

in the hair I brush each morning,

in the Cannon towel, newly washed,

that I rub my body with each morning,

in the chapel of eggs I cook

each morning,

in the outcry from the kettle

that heats my coffee

each morning,

in the spoon and the chair

that cry “hello there, Anne”

each morning,

in the godhead of the table

that I set my silver, plate, cup upon

each morning.

All this is God,

right here in my pea-green house

each morning

and I mean,

though often forget,

to give thanks,

to faint down by the kitchen table

in a prayer of rejoicing

as the holy birds at the kitchen window

peck into their marriage of seeds.

So while I think of it,

let me paint a thank-you on my palm

for this God, this laughter of the morning,

lest it go unspoken.

The Joy that isn’t shared, I’ve heard,

dies young.

~ Anne Sexton ~

More stories from: Featured Poem,Featured Story

A Poem About Life. . .and Death

Written by Barbara Crocker on March 19, 2012

I just loved this poem by multi-award-winning poet Barbara Crocker, especially the line, “sometimes we lie in the hammock, caught between the mesh of rope and the net of stars, suspended, tangled up in love, running out of time. . . .”

Do you feel like you are running out of time? Have you told the people around you you love them? Have you hugged your wife, or husband, or significant other, or child, or pet today?

IN THE MIDDLE. . .

of a life that’s as complicated as everyone else’s,

struggling for balance, juggling time.

The mantle clock that was my grandfather’s

has stopped at 9:20; we haven’t had time

to get it repaired. The brass pendulum is still,

the chimes don’t ring. One day you look out the window,

green summer, the next, and the leaves have already fallen,

and a grey sky lowers the horizon. Our children almost grown,

our parents gone, it happened so fast. Each day, we must learn

again how to love, between morning’s quick coffee

and evening’s slow return. Steam from a pot of soup rises,

mixing with the yeasty smell of baking bread. Our bodies

twine, and the big black dog pushes his great head between;

his tail is a metronome, 3/4 time. We’ll never get there,

Time is always ahead of us, running down the beach, urging

us on faster, faster, but sometimes we take off our watches,

sometimes we lie in the hammock, caught between the mesh

of rope and the net of stars, suspended, tangled up

in love, running out of time.

~ Barbara Crooker ~

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Inspiring Poem: Jump Rope Rhyme

Written by on January 23, 2012

JUMP ROPE RHYME

By Tom Hansen

Tat tvam asi:

thou art that –

that leaf, that tree,

that cow, that cat,

that cloud, that sky,

that moon, that sun,

that you, that I –

for all are one.

So here you are

and there you go

and who you were

you hardly know.

 

I think this I

is only me:

a drip, a drop,

but not the sea.

Yet when I wake

from all these dreams,

 

then, like the snake,

I’ll shed what seems:

this mask, this skin,

this ball and chain.

I will begin

to fall like rain.

 

Our heart’s last home:

the wind-whipped foam,

the sweet, deep sea.

Tat tvam asi.

 

 

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