Poetry Week

As an apology to you for not posting more regularly, I'm declaring this Poetry Week. I'm going to post a poem every day. I'm not sure yet if they'll all be by the same poet, but I can promise you they'll all be by my two or three favorite poets.

I'm starting with two poems by my very favorite, Ted Kooser. One for my grandmother, whose birthday is today, and one for all my mothers for Mothers' Day.

A Happy Birthday

This evening, I sat by an open window
and read till the light was gone and the book
was no more than a part of the darkness.
I could easily have switched on a lamp,
but I wanted to ride this day down into night,
to sit alone and smooth the unreadable page
with the pale gray ghost of my hand.

Flow Blue China

No real flowers would give of themselves
as these do, the soft tips of their petals
easing out under the painted gold borders,
then bleeding into puffs of blue, and the aunt
who in her old age gave me these cups
and saucers, the plates, bread plates and platters,
the gravy boat, and the big covered bowl
that for seventy years she brought to her table
heaped high with buttercup potatoes,
she too, like one of these soft blue flowers,
has slipped beyond the thin line at the edge.
I lift this cup to her. Flow, blue.