Poetry Corner Monday

This week I'm posting some pieces (full and excerpted) by Jim Moore, who I discovered by chance when I pulled a book of his poems off of a shelf in my library's threadbare poetry section. The first two are single stanzas plucked from larger pieces, but the final two are complete. Enjoy!

Love in the Ruins

1

      I remember my mother toward the end,

folding the tablecloth after dinner
      so carefully,
as if it were the flag
     of a country that no longer existed,
but once had ruled the world.


Five Charms in Praise of Bewilderment

3

     Sitting quietly at dusk, I'll admit

my life goes like this:
     dark branches
scratching the still darker window.


(I dedicate this next one to my darling Casey. Case, I love you very very much but when I move to Melbourne I don't give a good damn how much you hate flying, you ARE coming to visit me. It's a 15-hour flight--start prepping now.)


Waiting to Take Off

I try not to listen to the direction
     to the emergency exits,
how close they are,
     how very well lit.


Those Others

     We lived at the end of an empire.

Sometimes we gathered in huge auditoriums
     and tried to understand.
Our shame did not save us,
     nor our sadness redeem us,
as we came to understand
     how others, far into the future,
would look back at us,
     shaking their heads: we hoped
in sorrow; more likely, anger.