My favorite poems

I only have a few favorite poems. I never liked poetry - especially when I was immersed in reading one after another in my poetry class while in college. I didn't learn much from that class but I did learn that when I like a poem I really like a poem. Here are just 2 I hold very close to me. One is an old discovery and one is new.

BREAKFAST SONG
by Elizabeth Bishop


My love, my saving grace,
your eyes are awfully blue.
I kiss your funny face,
your coffee-flavored mouth.
Last night I slept with you.
Today I love you so
how can I bear to go
(as soon I must, I know)
to bed with ugly death
in that cold, filthy place,
to sleep there without you,
without the easy breath
and nightlong, limblong warmth
I've grown accustomed to?
--Nobody wants to die;
tell me it is a lie!
But no, I know it's true.
It's just the common case;
there's nothing one can do.
My love, my saving grace,
your eyes are awfully blue
early and instant blue.





COOK
By Jane Hirshfield

Each night you come home with five continents on your hands:

garlic, olive oil, saffron, anise, coriander, tea,

your fingernails blackened with marjoram and thyme.

Sometimes the zucchini's flesh seems like a fish-steak,

cut into neat filets, or the salt-rubbed eggplant

yields not bitter water, but dark mystery.

You cut everything to bits.

No core, no kernel, no seed is sacred: you cut

onions for hours and do not cry,

cut them to thin transparencies, the red ones

spreading before you like fallen flowers;

you cut scallions from white to green, you cut

radishes, apples, broccoli, you cut oranges, watercress,

romaine, you cut your fingers, you cut and cut

beyond the heart of things, where

nothing remains, and you cut that too, scoring coup

on the butcherblock, leaving your mark,

when you go

your feet are as pounded as brioche dough.