P is for (Good) Poems

Okay, I'm cheating here a bit, but I had this post planned for the letter G and never used it, so I decided, since it IS National Poetry Month, it would be okay to post twice in this challenge about poems. P is definitely for Poems.

I acquired Good Poems, classic and contemporary poems selected and arranged by Garrison Keillor, in Sept 2010 from Amazon.

I sometimes listen to a podcast called The Writer's Almanac (supported by the Poetry Foundation), in which Garrison Keillor talks for a minute or so about what happened 'on this day' in the life of famous writers or poets, and he ends with the reading of a poem. Which led me to checking out the website, which led me to putting this book on my Amazon wishlist. Then, for my birthday, my son gave me a generous Amazon gift card, so I purchased about 4 books, this being one of them. Every once in a while I pick it up and read a few poems.

Here's my choice for today:

Welcome Morning by Anne Sexton

There is joy

in all:

in the hair I brush each morning

in the Cannon towel, newly washed,

that I rub my body with each morning,

in the chapel of eggs I cook

each morning.

All this is God,

right here in my pea-green house

each morning

and I mean,

though often forget,

to give thanks,\

to faint down by the kitchen table

in a prayer of rejoicing

as the holy birds at the kitchen window

peck into their marriage of seeds.

So while I think of it,

let me paint a thank-you on my palm

for this God, this laughter of the morning,

lest it go unspoken.

The Joy that isn't shared, I've heard,

dies young.

This would be a great book to add to your collection. As the introduction states, 'Good Poems is for anybody who loves poetry, whether they know it or not'.