River Poems
The Mississippi River Empties Into The Gulf
by Lucille Clifton
and the gulf enters the sea and so forth,
none of them emptying anything,
all of them carrying yesterday
forever on their white tipped backs,
all of them dragging forward tomorrow.
it is the great circulation
of the earth's body, like the blood
of the gods, this river in which the past
is always flowing. every water
is the same water coming round.
......
Meditations In Time Of Civil War
by William Butler Yeats
I
Ancestral Houses
SURELY among a rich man s flowering lawns,
Amid the rustle of his planted hills,
Life overflows without ambitious pains;
And rains down life until the basin spills,
And mounts more dizzy high the more it rains
As though to choose whatever shape it wills
And never stoop to a mechanical
Or servile shape, at others' beck and call.
......
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;
......
Passport
by Mahmoud Darwish
They did not recognize me in the shadows
That suck away my color in this Passport
And to them my wound was an exhibit
For a tourist Who loves to collect photographs
They did not recognize me,
Ah... Don't leave
The palm of my hand without the sun
Because the trees recognize me
Don't leave me pale like the moon!
......
A Song Of Despair
by Pablo Neruda
The memory of you emerges from the night around me.
The river mingles its stubborn lament with the sea.
Deserted like the wharves at dawn.
It is the hour of departure, oh deserted one!
Cold flower heads are raining over my heart.
Oh pit of debris, fierce cave of the shipwrecked.
In you the wars and the flights accumulated.
......
unsigned horizon
by Rikske Kessner
“unsigned horizon”
The horizon stays unsigned,
a gray span that won’t take a mark.
The raft holds by its own inward pull,
nothing formal keeping it together.
No place for the shore to grab hold,
no cut in the wood for a hook
to turn it toward the wharf.
......
Limpopo
by Mario Odekerken
The river moves without hurry,
a silver muscle through the dry land,
its edges holding the scent of dust and salt.
Children's laughter bends the reeds,
a cow drinks,
and somewhere a crocodile blinks,anciet and patient.
The sun spreads like a blanket over everything,
villages shimmer,
......
A Song of Resilience
by Ayatullah Nurjati
In mountains high and rivers wide,
Nature speaks, no truth to hide.
It bends, it breaks, but it endures,
Through storms and rains, its heart secure.
Look to the earth, O soul of mine,
In its resilience, God’s grace shines.
A life of trials, yet peace it brings,
Nature whispers the wisdom of kings.
......
Love: Uniting Grace
by Ayatullah Nurjati
Love is the light of the Almighty,
Rising softly in the heart, greeting the soul,
Flowing like a river in the valley of life,
Bringing hope to life amidst despair.
It is present without form, but felt,
Erasing wounds, stringing together hopes,
Uniting souls that were once separated,
In the arms of love that never tires.
......
A Prayer To The Goddess, Ganga
by Pijush Biswas
O Ganga, who doth not take pride in thy arms
The earthly life, scornful, is always proud of thy touch
O Ganga, who doth not take pride in thy divine alms
O thou, let the life be full of joy and happiness much.
Thou, look into our eyes; somewhere thou must be.
Now, our lives today are so uplifted anew by thy privacy
Or, into the core of our lives we seek thy eternity,
Open eyed, to manure lives, or to be heir to thy legacy.
Let us seek beauty in thee, O! let us be free from obscurity.
......
