happy poetry morning!

I'm generally nothing but annoyed by the endless opportunities for readers/listeners/viewers to express our opinions of whatever the sound bite of the day may be - I don't watch the news to get Mike from Omaha's opinion on things, and I don't really think everything from NBA Finals (go Celtics!) MVP to President of the Unites States should be treated like an American Idol-esque popularity contest in which the people with the twitchiest text-messaging thumbs get the illusion of majority rule.

But occassionally what I might (on a good day) call collaborative or open-source journalism is actually delightful. Such is today's call in the NY Times for readers' favorite poems, pursuant to a wonderful story about a team of young poets from the Santa Fe Indian School competing at the International Youth Poetry Slam Festival in Washington D.C.

Have you ever gone to a poetry slam? Yeah, they vary in quality and you might hear a poem that is laughably lousy (or squirmingly inappropriate). But a good slam poet will make you laugh, cry, shiver and gasp for breath, all in a few stanzas. I was lucky enough to be able to attend the semifinals (not even the finals!) of the National Poetry Slam Championships in Minneapolis a few years ago, and honest to God I walked out of that building with my faith in the magical possibilities of humanity restored.

And that's not a bad way to spend a few hours.

(For an excellent introduction to slam poetry, watch this.)

So I started my workday today by reading some favorite poems of people all over the world, and commenting on a few of my own. In case you're curious, below are a couple of my favorites. And now that I'm on this kick I just want to keep sharing poems. I think I'm declaring the first official Poetry Week on Monkeyhippy's Adventures (OK, so some of my adventures are fairly low-key). Watch for more poems. This particular week might not end up being exactly seven days long, we'll see... And if you have a favorite, post it or at least the title in the comments, please!

Como Tu (Like You) by Roque Dalton [click for translation and more info about Dalton]
Yo, como tu,
amo el amor, la vida,
el dulce encanto de las cosas,
el paisaje celeste de los dias de enero.

Tambien mi sangre bulle
y rio por los ojos
que han conocido el brote de las lagrimas.

Creo que el mundo es bello,
que la poesia es como el pan,
de todos.

Y que mis venas no terminan en mi
sino en la sangre unanime de las que luchan por la vida,
el amor, las cosas, el paisaje y el pan,
la poesia de todos

To Be Of Use by Marge Piercy [and, truly, anything by Marge Piercy]*
The people I love the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half submerged balls.

I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.

I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who stand in the line and haul in their places,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.

The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.

*Particularly "Report of the Fourteenth Subcommittee on Convening a Discussion Group"