Speech to the Young Speech to the Progress-Toward (Among Them Nora and Henry III) Say to them, say to the down-keepers, the sun-slappers, the self-soilers, the harmony-hushers, "Even if you are not ready for day it cannot always be night." You will be right. For that is the hard home-run. Live not for battles won. Live not for the-end-of-the-song. Live in the along. Gwendolyn Brooks (b. 1917) "Speech to the Young" by Gwendolyn Brooks, from BLACKS (Chicago, IL: Third World Press, 1991). Copyright © 1991 by Gwendolyn Brooks Blakely. Reprinted with the permission of the author. A Man Said to the Universe A man said to the universe: "Sir, I exist!" "However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation." Stephen Crane (1871-1900) For Friendship For friendship make a chain that holds, to be bound to others, two by two, a walk, a garland, handed by hands that cannot move unless they hold. Robert Creeley (b. 1926) "For Friendship" from The Collected Poems of Robert Creeley 1945-1975 by Robert Creeley. Copyright © 1983. Reprinted with the permission of the author and the University of California Press. Sandinista Avioncitos The little airplanes of the heart with their brave little propellers What can they do against the winds of darkness even as butterflies are beaten back by hurricanes yet do not die They lie in wait wherever they can hide and hang their fine wings folded and when the killer-wind dies they flutter forth again into the new-blown light live as leaves Lawrence Ferlinghetti (b. 1919) "Sandinista Advioncitos" from These Are My Rivers: New & Selected Poems, 1955-1993 by Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Copyright © 1993. Reprinted with the permission of New Directions Publishing Corporation. Blackberry Eating I love to go out in late September among the fat, overripe, icy, black blackberries to eat blackberries for breakfast, the stalks very prickly, a penalty they earn for knowing the black art of blackberry-making; and as I stand among them lifting the stalks to my mouth, the ripest berries fall almost unbidden to my tongue, as words sometimes do, certain peculiar words like strengths and squinched, many-lettered, on-syllabled lumps, which I squeeze, squinch open, and splurge well in the silent, startled, icy, black language of blackberry-eating in late September. Galway Kinnell (b. 1927) "Blackberry Eating" from Mortal Acts, Mortal Words by Galway Kinnell. Copyright © 1980. Reprinted with the permission of Houghton Mifflin Company. The Question People always say to me "What do you think you'd like to be When you grow up?" And I say, "Why, I think I'd like to be the sky Or be a plane or train or mouse Or maybe a haunted house Or something furry, rough and wild... Or maybe I will stay a child." Karla Kuskin (b. 1932) "The Question" from Dog & Dragons, Trees & Dreams by Karla Kuskin. Originally appeared in In the Middle of the Trees. Copyright © 1958. Reprinted with permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. Hermandad Brotherhood Homenaje a Claudio Ptolomeo Homage to Claudius Ptolemy Soy hombre: duro poco I am a man: little do I last y es enorme la noche. and the night is enormous. Pero miro hacia arribo But I look up: las estrellas escriben. the stars write. Sin entender comprendo: Unknowing I understand: tambiŽn soy escritura I too am written, y en este mismo instante and at this very moment alguien me deletrea. someone spells me out. Octavio Paz Translated from the Spanish by Eliot Weinberger "Brotherhood" ("Hermandad"), translated by Eliot Weinberger, from Octavio Paz: Collected Poems by Octavio Paz. Copyright © 1987, 1988 by Octavio Paz and Eliot Weinberger. Reprinted with the permission of New Directions Publishing Corporation. from The Love Poems of Marichiko You ask me what I thought about Before we were lovers. The answer is easy. Before I met you I didn't have anything to think about. Kenneth Rexroth (1905-1982) "The Love Poems of Marichiko" (excerpt) from The Morning Star by Kenneth Rexroth. Copyright © 1979. Reprinted with the permission of New Directions Publishing Corporation. from Lost Sister In China, even the peasants named their first daughters Jade— the stone that in the far fields could moisten the dry season, could make men move mountains for the healing green of the inner hills glistening like slices of winter melon. Cathy Song (b. 1955) "Lost Sister" (excerpt) from Picture Bride by Cathy Song. Copyright © 1983. Reprinted with the permission of Yale University of Press.