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2 Poems by Naomi Shihab Nye

3/5/2021

1 Comment

 
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Naomi Shihab Nye received the Ivan Sandrof Award for Lifetime Achievement from the National Books Critics Circle, 2020. She is Young People's Poet Laureate of the United States (Poetry Foundation) and on faculty at Texas State University. Her most recent books are, Everything Comes Next, Collected & New Poems, Cast Away, The Tiny Journalist, and Voices in the Air, Poems for Listeners.  Recently she was a guest interviewer for The Quarantine Tapes. ​
Weniger, aber besser (Less, but better)


It’s fun to blame ourselves for things.
It’s a relief.
The puff of big dreams
shrivels back to normal size.
You think, Probably not.
Probably I won’t get that done
and it won’t matter.
I’m not up for that today.
It’s great to wrap our arms around No
and stay put. I’m fine with failure.
Only you
know what
you didn’t do.


​

Palestine


My grandmother knew
the real treasure of the world
was a pink line on the horizon.
Owned by none,
commanded by none.
Every evening she climbed
a rickety wooden ladder
barefooted
to the flat roof
of her very simple home
to gaze out over stolen hillsides
and valleys
and smile.
The valleys were small
next to the sky.
1 Comment
Becky Patterson
3/6/2021 08:34:54 am

Oh Naomi. On my porch with my only best friend kitty in my lap helping me great the day. I too am watching that thin hot GLO orange liger bringing everything to life over destruction of the ice storm. Piles of trees broken maybe never to live again. Ice storm a thief leaving us with Broken pipes. I’m stealing your grandmothers smile and hope to carry on.
Less is More is how I live my life. I’d rather not do all this stuff. Thank you for simplifying the thought and allowing me to think it’s ok for my initiative and desire to be atrophied. Your are the best.
Kerry’s death anniversary yesterday. He was a genius with a graphite pencil. A “Mild gesture of a whisper”

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