5 verses that calm: poetry to combat uncertainty and anxiety

December 01, 2020 at 13:46 p.m.
Verses that calm: 5 poems to combat uncertainty and anxiety. PHOTO: Unsplash
Verses that calm: 5 poems to combat uncertainty and anxiety. PHOTO: Unsplash

 

La poetry As a tool of manifestation or condemnation, it can be a very fine spearhead, while at the same time functioning as a warm balm to understand and heal emotions.

This is a selection of five poems of a different nature, inspired by the Poetry Foundation to address the uncertainty and anxiety of this age with verses.



"This room and everything in it" - Li-young Lee

Lay still now

As I prepare for my future

certain difficult days ahead,

When I need what I know so clearly right now


 

I am using

the only thing that I learned

of all the things my father tried to teach me:

The art of the memory.


 

I'm leaving this room

and everything in it

defend my ideas about love

and its difficulties.


 

I will stop your love cries

those spacious notes

from a moment ago,

represents distance.


 

Your smell

that smell

of spice and a wound,

I'll let the mystery be.



Your sunken belly

is the daily cup

of milk that I drank

like a child before morning prayer.

The sun in the face

of the wall

it's god, the face

I can't see my soul



and so on, each thing

representing a separate idea,

and those ideas that make up the constellation

of my biggest idea.

And one day when I need it

tell me something smart

about love,



I will close my eyes

and remember this room and everything in it:

My body is an estrangement.

This desire, perfection.

Your eyes closed my extinction.

Now I have forgotten my

idea. The book

on the windowsill, shaken by the wind. . .

the even pages are

the past, the stranger

numbered pages, the future.

The sun is

God, your body is milk. . .



useless, useless. . .

Your cries are songs, my body is not me. . .

not good . . . my idea

it has evaporated. . . Your hair is time, your thighs are song. . .

had something to do

with death. . . had something

to do with love.

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"In this short Life that only lasts one hour (1292)" - Emily Dickinson

In this short life that only lasts an hour

How much more, how much less, is within our reach


 

"Long, too long America" ​​- Walt Whitman

Long too long America

Traveling by roads all uniform and peaceful, you learned only of joys and prosperity,

But now ah! now, to learn from the crisis of anguish, moving forward, dealing with the most terrible fate and without retreating,

And now to conceive and show the world what your children really are en masse,

(Because who, except me, has yet conceived what her children really are en masse?)

 

What kind of times are these? - Adrienne Rich

There is a place between two groups of trees where the grass grows uphill

and the old revolutionary road breaks into shadows

near a meeting house abandoned by the persecuted

that disappeared in those shadows.



I walked there picking mushrooms on the brink of terror, but don't be fooled

this is not a russian poem, this is not elsewhere but here,

our country approaching its own truth and dread,

their own ways of making people disappear.



I won't tell you where the place is, the dark mesh of the forest

finding the unmarked strip of light

ghost-ridden crossroads, mold heaven:

I know who wants to buy it, sell it, make it disappear.



And I won't tell you where it is, so why am I telling you?

anything? Because you keep listening, because in times like these

for you to listen to me, it is necessary

talk about trees.

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"Let me" - Chungmi Kim

If I should worry about how

I will live in my old age

no wealth

I would be without health now

and how can I live to be

old?

If I should worry about how

I will live in my old age

Loveless

I'd be dreamless now

and how am I going to continue living

another day?

Let me sit in the sun

and listen to the sky.

I will love you gently. 

Let me stay in my room

and weave my rainbows.

I will really love you.

Like a colt in the meadow

Unlimited

Will allow me

wander

until I hear the fall

stealthily

walking by my door.

I'll be waiting

be with you

so.