Compilation Poem / 2025

 

I typically take notes from the books I read as

a good book quote is one of my small joys.

Here is an edited collection ~ a compilation from this last reading year.

A found poem of sorts?

I'm no writer, but I am a keen collector of words.

COMPILATION POEM / 2025

1.

Good books are the ultimate solace

2.

Goal: Integration as we start where we are

3.

The answer is written in God's notebook.

4.

She lives inside the workings of a clock, 

& it's grinding time through her bones

5.

Then there are days like these. 

I've had them before & I know they come, 

so I also know they end.

6.

A woman's most joyous kingdom is her home - 

her highest honour, the art of ruling it. 

Not as a queen, but as a wife & mother.

7.

Mum never was much of a cook. 

She found it all a bit of an ordeal.

 

8.

There's been a helluva lot of washing up.

9.

The force of despair is exacerbated by inertia.

10.

What a hodgepodge the world was.

11.

No one can turn back the clock.

12.

He suspected that he was beginning, 

ten years late, 

to discover who he was; 

& the figure he saw was both more & less 

than he had once imagined it to be.

13.

The losses & disappointments of adulthood.

What can you recall of the disasters, the days of grace?

Your lot will fall into place, one day at a time.

Take it bird by bird, buddy.

14.

It's hard to change, even though, 

I know, I know. 

You have to change.

This day contains multitudes. 

Every day does.

Beer & then wine, feeling just fine?

15.

When something wakes me at night, I often dress 

& go quietly forth on an exploring expedition.

16.

We share the belief that beyond the visible world 

is a truer realm.

17.

What we in our certainty could not have fathomed, 

is that stuff comes up. Weird doors open. 

People fall into things. My path was a winding one, 

with plenty of obstacles along the way.

We're an aging monogamous couple ~ 

this is all part of the bargain.

18.

It is the most deeply lived-in year of our lives.

The city marks my soul with an indelible graffiti. 

There is too much of too much there.

19.

Stories are our most reliable medicine

20.

Sometimes we learn new things.

Let us be tender with our earlier selves, 

like wiser, older sisters. 

Like good, good mothers.

21.

I will buy oranges, 

I will have a positive attitude, 

take care of myself... 

these good thoughts carry me 

until I'm right downtown.

I see that there will be no end to imperfection.

There is never only one of anyone.

God first made the body out of dirt, 

& after he breathed in the soul. 

Both are necessary. 

Dirt & soul.

It is my lifeline, my real life. 

I begin to eliminate whatever does not fit with it, 

paring myself down.

I can see the heart. 

There it is, bright red, rounded, 

with a dark light around it, 

a blackness like luminous velvet. 

Gold comes out of the centre, then fades. 

It's the heart all right.

22.

The heart & the mind, 

what an enigma.

23.

What you call a crisis, 

might be an awakening.

PAUSE -

perhaps 

an 

unseen 

solution 

exists.

24.

Family vignette - for just a few minutes, 

everything is more or less okay

25.

This thou perceivest, 

which makes thy love more strong, 

to love that well 

which thou must leave ere long

26.

She was faithful to a single patch of earth 

for the duration of her life - 

a creature of habit with set hours 

& favourite places.

27.

It is too dark to read, 

but light enough to stand barefoot 

on the stone terrace, 

drink in hand.

28.

Dear God, 

thank you for all that has been given, 

for all that has been taken away, 

& all that remains.

//

Sources

1 / Bird by Bird

2 / The Plan

3 / The Housekeeper & the Professor

4 / Orbital

5 / Brightly Shining

6 / Little Women

7 / Toast

8 / One Thousand Feasts

9 / The Unexpected Joy of the Ordinary

10 / The Bell Jar

11 / The End of Loneliness

12 / Stoner 

13 / Bird by Bird

14 / Sandwich

15 / The Outermost House

16 / Dusk Night Dawn

17 / When We Are Engulfed in Flames

18 / Prince of Tides

19 / Dusk, Night, Dawn

20 / Awake

21 /  Cat's Eye

22 /  We Did Okay, Kid

23 /  All the Way to the River

24 / Bird by Bird

One Thousand Feasts

25 / Stoner

26 / Raising Hare

27 / One Thousand Feasts

28 / All the Way to the River

//

Compilation Poem - 

A Condensed Version

START WITH TODAY

The Dark Side of the Moon

Pilgrim's Progress

A BOWL OF RICE

An Ode to Midlife

An Ode to Lazy Dinners

An Ode to Cleaning

PLASTIC FLOWERS

the cosmic banana peel

BIRD BY BIRD

Nuit of the Living Dead

"Thorry"

The Village Idiot

"D'accord"

Momento Mori

the Smoking Section

Caesar the Tiger

FRIED EGGS

Morning Jen, Night Jen

the streetcar

the strawstack

THE HEART

Earth School

//

Cheers to starting a fresh new notebook.