May 2012
“You won’t allow me to go to school.
I won’t become a doctor.
Remember this:
One day you will be sick.” —
I won’t become a doctor.
Remember this:
One day you will be sick.” —
Poem written by an 11 year old Afghan girl
This poem was recorded in a NYT magazine article about female underground poetry groups in Afghanistan. An amazing article about the ways in which women are using a traditional two line poetry form to express their resistance to male oppression, their feelings about love (considered blasphemous), and their doubts about religion.
(via blua)
April 2012
(via chaiwolf:growing-orbits:
The Way It Is
There’s a thread you follow. It goes among
things that change. But it doesn’t change.
People wonder about what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the thread.
But it is hard for others to see.
While you hold it you can’t get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; and you suffer and get old.
Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding.
You don’t ever let go of the thread.
— William Stafford
“People will never stop asking you if you’re eventually going to go to college. And unless you’re clairvoyant, you will never be able to answer this question, which doesn’t stop people from asking it all the time. No matter what you’re deciding to do with your life, your answer will never seem good enough for some people. You have to learn to mentally flip the bird to them as you respond with something light and pithy, like, “Oh, who knows! Maybe one day.” These are the same people that will eventually plague your life with questions like, “When are you going to get married?” or “Don’t you want to have a baby?” What they’re really asking is, “So where exactly do you fit into this framework of social acceptance that I have bought into?” They are judging you by their own standards, and you shouldn’t be made to feel inferior as a result of not conforming to them. Even with a college degree, you’ll never know how things are going to turn out for you.”
—Rookie » Skipping School (via colporteur)
CAConrad, "SIX"
in my
scary time
black letters
vanish in
the blue
the living
GIANTS
of Earth
are trees
keeping time by the thistle
to season weeds and their
sensual goals
a new kind of sparrow
shoots from my fears
chide it into a
cloud of itself
a golden needle
stitches my head to
my knee leaving me
aching along the river
STOP telling me damage can
ameliorate our lives
STOP trying to include
me in your portrait of
quietly dying poets
“[Around me the trees stir in their leaves
and call out, “Stay awhile.”
The light flows from their branches.]
And they call again, “It’s simple,” they say,
“and you too have come
into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine.” —Mary Oliver, from “When I Am Among Trees” (via the-final-sentence)
and call out, “Stay awhile.”
The light flows from their branches.]
And they call again, “It’s simple,” they say,
“and you too have come
into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine.” —Mary Oliver, from “When I Am Among Trees” (via the-final-sentence)
