Gratitude
Gratitude . . .
to the parts of my body
that quietly do
what they are supposed to do
like my in-breath
and out-breath,
how they do not ask for attention
or praise,
What if I had to think about
each of them
not as meditation,
but in the dailiness,
of each waking hour?
Finding Home
How do we pronounce the names of the dead,
how do we say their beautiful names?
Under our masks, in our yearning for more,
let us not forget their names.
As we hunger to be seen and heard
Let us not forget their beautiful names.
******
I put all my troubles on a piece of paper, burned it
and flushed the ashes down the toilet, she said,
As if somehow she knew
that no matter our transgressions
if we remember the names of the dead,
the compassion of our ancestors
will surely see us home.
Despair
I take sanctuary in the trees,
in this small circle between the oaks,
pines and cedars
where the wind plays freely
and the leaves invite my spirit
to dance.
The soft blue of endless sky
reminds me that everything
here is small
—even despair—
and that I am a part of something
far more wonderous -- this sanctuary
of mystery, sunlight, shadows
and this breeze that ruffles my hair
like my father did when he felt proud
of his son, and I never guessed
that life was anything but good.
Michael S. Glaser is a Professor Emeritus at St. Mary’s College of Maryland and served as Poet Laureate of Maryland from 2004 to 2009. The recipient of several awards for his teaching, his service to poetry, and for his poetry, he has published several prize winning collections of his own poetry, most recently The Threshold of Light ( Bright Hills Press, 2019) and Elemental Things, (The Poetry Box, 2022). He has also edited three anthologies and co-edited The Collected Poems of Lucille Clifton.