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Popular Home Poems

Testament

by Wendell Berry

And now to the Abyss I pass
Of that Unfathomable Grass...

1.
Dear relatives and friends, when my last breath
Grows large and free in air, don't call it death --
A word to enrich the undertaker and inspire
His surly art of imitating life; conspire
Against him. Say that my body cannot now
Be improved upon; it has no fault to show

......

A Timbered Choir

by Wendell Berry

Even while I dreamed I prayed that what I saw was only fear and no foretelling,
for I saw the last known landscape destroyed for the sake
of the objective, the soil bludgeoned, the rock blasted.
Those who had wanted to go home would never get there now.

I visited the offices where for the sake of the objective the planners planned
at blank desks set in rows. I visited the loud factories
where the machines were made that would drive ever forward
toward the objective. I saw the forest reduced to stumps and gullies; I saw
the poisoned river, the mountain cast into the valley;

......

Questions Of Travel

by Elizabeth Bishop

There are too many waterfalls here; the crowded streams
hurry too rapidly down to the sea,
and the pressure of so many clouds on the mountaintops
makes them spill over the sides in soft slow-motion,
turning to waterfalls under our very eyes.
- For if those streaks, those mile-long, shiny, tearstains,
aren't waterfalls yet,
in a quick age or so, as ages go here,
they probably will be.
But if the streams and clouds keep travelling, travelling,

......

The Land Of Story-Books

by Robert Louis Stevenson

At evening when the lamp is lit,
Around the fire my parents sit;
They sit at home and talk and sing,
And do not play at anything.

Now, with my little gun, I crawl
All in the dark along the wall,
And follow round the forest track
Away behind the sofa back.

......

Vocation

by Rabindranath Tagore

When the gong sounds ten in the morning and I walk to school by our
lane.
Every day I meet the hawker crying, "Bangles, crystal
bangles!"
There is nothing to hurry him on, there is no road he must
take, no place he must go to, no time when he must come home.
I wish I were a hawker, spending my day in the road, crying,
"Bangles, crystal bangles!"
When at four in the afternoon I come back from the school,
I can see through the gate of that house the gardener digging

......

Recent Home Poems

I will praise God

by Aldo Kraas

I will praise God
For everything he did
For me
Yes he is the one that
Made me
In his image
Many years ago
Also I am happy that
I am alive every
Day here on earth

......

Harry : Ode to Cat

by Ghairo Daniels

Aah Harry ! How can we not ode a domestic cat
cousin of the great Lyrans of Cosmic Fate : leo, jaguar, panther, lynx, tiger, cheetah to name but a few — you carry their genetic makeup across dews, giving these chosen their gross due ~

geometric accurate your agility to leap onto roof
imitating their ricochets into branches rustle, to view jungle, forest or curious humans tour ogling
as you sound your mellow meows to starlings
harking —- even to crows soaring, cat darling !

across time’s hours your intuition assess a neighbour’s aches and pains, where you visit
to dish cat medicine by purring for gain, so sane

......

The Place Most Loved

by Evelyn Judy Buehler

Ada Scott was a widowed old woman, living in rolling hills country;
In jade, flowering days of full sun, when ecstatic bees made honey.

She lived in the same cottage she was born, quite a long time ago;
On a night of amaranth starlight, when moon peered into windows.

She was well known and loved in the neighborhood, like red robin;
And participated in church activities, like caring deeds, unforgotten.

Ada and friends went to Friday fairs, and offered fresh pies for sale;

......

The Needs of the Village

by Sameen Shakya

Childhood’s distant garden held
Readable roles:

Father, mother, brother, sister,
Uncle, aunt, teacher, friend,
Distant relative or stranger.

Each hand was browned by the same soil;
Carrying a recognizable smell,
Digging, tilling, sowing and cultivating

......

Home; Address

by Kara Prince

“I made it home safe!” That text was a lie. Yes, I am safe, but I am not home. The weather app says it's cloudy, but I must scroll to a new city to see the same sun outside my window. I never know what to say when the receptionist asks for my permanent address. I could give the meaningless string of numbers that decorate the front porch of my leased space, but they asked about my home. Home is where my father etched my name into the still-wet concrete that boasted countless chalk masterpieces. Home is where my mother notched out the only proof that I was once the bigger sibling. Home is where I had a brother I could scream at through a slammed door, not schedule a call with from hundreds of miles apart. Where I live now boasts wine glasses and brie, and yet I am hungry for home, with its expired condiments and cozy mess.