Poetry Friday: "A New Poet"

This month's challenge to and for the Poetry Peeps was to write  "____ is A Word Poems" (a wordplay exercise created by poet Nikki Grimes and shared here by Michelle Barnes.) 

I didn't have time to rise to the challenge, but I'm sharing a poem about meeting new poets, which is one of the things I love about Poetry Friday.

Denise Krebs at Dare to Care is hosting the Poetry Friday round-up this week, and she's daring to care about the state of our country and some rapidly vanishing liberties. Thank you, Denise. 

A New Poet 

by Linda Pastan 

Finding a new poet
is like finding a new wildflower
out in the woods. You don't see

its name in the flower books, and
nobody you tell believes
in its odd color or the way

....

(Read the rest here, at Library of Congress/Poetry 180.) 

~~~~~

Photo thanks to Hazi54, Pixabay

Poetry Friday: "300 Goats" by Naomi Shihab Nye

I wanted to share this one by Naomi Shihab Nye for a few reasons: 

• It's Naomi Shihab Nye. 
• It's about goats. I've always liked goats, and now they make me think about Severance, and I'm obsessed with Severance. 
• It's Naomi Shihab Nye. 

So. Poetry. Goats. Severance. 

You're welcome. 

300 Goats
by Naomi Shihab Nye

In icy fields.
Is water flowing in the tank?
Will they huddle together, warm bodies pressing?
(Is it the year of the goat or the sheep?

....

(Read the rest of this short, delightful poem here, and you can listen to the poet reading it here.) 

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The Poetry Friday round-up this week is being hosted by Laura Purdie Salas. 

Photo thanks to RitaE at Pixabay. 

Poetry Friday: VII by Wendell Berry

This ("Sabbaths, 2005, VII") is a beautiful one from Wendell Berry. 

It begins like this:

I know I am getting old and I say so,
but I don't think of myself as an old man.
I think of myself as a young man
with unforeseen debilities. 

and ends like this: 

...And you, who are as old
almost as I am, I love as I loved you
young, except that, old, I am astonished
at such a possibility, and am duly grateful.

And now you must go here to read the dozen or so lines between that exquisite beginning and that sublime ending. 

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Carol Varsalona has the Poetry Friday round-up today at Beyond LiteracyLink. 

(Image by Mirka at Pixabay.)