Tag Archives: Naomi Shihab Nye

I want to be famous.

poetry, saints, , ,

Five years ago I shared this poem, on the occasion of my name day, which is the day some Orthodox commemorate Joanna the Myrrhbearer. That day is coming up this weekend, and I was longing for a poem to feed on. This is the right one for me now, again.

FAMOUS

The river is famous to the fish.

The loud voice is famous to silence,
which knew it would inherit the earth
before anybody said so.

The cat sleeping on the fence is famous to the birds
watching him from the birdhouse.

The tear is famous, briefly, to the cheek.

The idea you carry close to your bosom
is famous to your bosom.

The boot is famous to the earth,
more famous than the dress shoe,
which is famous only to floors.

The bent photograph is famous to the one who carries it
and not at all famous to the one who is pictured.

I want to be famous to shuffling men
who smile while crossing streets,
sticky children in grocery lines,
famous as the one who smiled back.

I want to be famous in the way a pulley is famous,
or a buttonhole, not because it did anything spectacular,
but because it never forgot what it could do.

-Naomi Shihab Nye, from Words Under the Words: Selected Poems

 

 

Girl on Bachelors Button

my garden, poetry, ,

IMG_2706I knew that Bachelors Buttons get straggly, and that there was no obvious place that they would fit in my new garden, but I was drawn in by these phrases in the nursery description:

…well loved …. quite edible and delightful to sprinkle on cakes, in salads, and in herb infused waters …. range from deep clear blue to violet, deep burgundy, pale pink, fuchsia, and white…. grow to 3½ feet tall and flower continuously throughout the summer.

…so I bought a six-pack. I stuck them behind the playhouse where they grew leggily much higher that expected and are leaning on the hopbush. They are pretty if you focus on the colors of the flowers.

I went out this morning to take a picture before the sun broke all the way through the fog, and soon realized that a bee was enjoying them at the same time, surely even more than I. She is on a pale pink bloom in the upper left of this top photo. I began to focus on the fauna on my flora.

Now I can add her to my collection of bees on flowers. She was the easiest one I’ve ever tried to catch in the middle of her work, and she makes me glad I planted these buttons.

gl IMG_2716 bee on bachelor's button blue

Suddenly it occurs to me to post Naomi Shihab Nye’s poem “Girls, Girls” in its entirety. It is about these insects, and is what made me realize that I want to use the female pronoun when talking about them.

GIRLS, GIRLS

When the boys are alone,
they wash the dishes with facecloths.

When a honeybee is alone — rare, very rare —
it tastes the sweetness
it lives inside all the time.

What pollen are we gathering, anyway?
Bees take naps, too.
Maybe honeybees taste pollen side by side
pretending they’re alone.
Maybe the concept of “alone” means nothing
in a hive.

A bumblebee is not a honeybee.
It only pretends to be.

The cell phone in your pocket
buzzes against your leg.
It’s not a honeybee, though. It’s just a
mining bee, or leaf-cutter, or
carpenter.

You’re stung by messages from people far away.
You can’t make anyone well.
You can’t stop a war.
What good are you?

Bees drink from thousands of flowers,
spitting up nectar
so you may have honey
in your tea.

Maybe you don’t want to think about it
so much.
Pass the honey please.

During winter, bees lock legs
and beat wings fast to stay warm.
Fifty thousand bees can live in
a single hive.
Clover honey is most popular
and clover is a weed.
All the worker bees are female.
Why is that no surprise?

-Naomi Shihab Nye, from Honeybee

gl IMG_2728 irish bee from scotland 05

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Above, a bee decoration made in Ireland,
which I bought when Pippin and I were in Scotland.

Happiness floats.

poetry,

As I drove away from the Office Max parking lot yesterday afternoon, “Scheherazade” was playing on the radio, and I crossed myself in a prayer, and immediately wondered why I did that. Why was I suddenly so full of joy and peace that I had to acknowledge the Holy Trinity and the fact that I was in His presence? It was a response to the beauty of the music, and a praise to the Creator of humans in His image, who are empowered to become co-creators after Him. But it was also a gift, unexplainable, this gladness to be alive. It is something to accept, and a place to live in, for however many moments I can keep it.

I have been reading a lot of poems lately. I want to say I’ve browsed through volumes large and small, collections by various poets….but I think a different word would be more honest, something like rummaged or skipped, or plowed. It doesn’t seem very respectful of the poets’ work, or quite civilized — until I find a poem to sink into, and then I am calmed and fed.

This morning I am sitting in the garden, listening to the fountain gurgle nearby. Also to the vague rock music coming through the walls of one neighbor’s house, and a saw sound buzzing over from another neighbor. After I finished breakfast I copied a couple of poems by Naomi Shihab Nye into my notebook, but this one I wanted to put up here instead, as it reminded me of that wonderful minute that I was given yesterday.

So Much Happiness

for Michael

It is difficult to know what to do with so much happiness.
With sadness there is something to rub against,
a wound to tend with lotion and cloth.
When the world falls in around you, you have pieces to pick up,
something to hold in your hands, like ticket stubs or change.

But happiness floats.
It doesn’t need you to hold it down.
It doesn’t need anything.
Happiness lands on the roof of the next house, singing,
and disappears when it wants to.
You are happy either way.
Even the fact that you once lived in a peaceful tree house
and now live over a quarry of noise and dust
cannot make you unhappy.
Everything has a life of its own,
it too could wake up filled with possibilities
of coffee cake and ripe peaches,
and love even the floor which needs to be swept,
the soiled linens and scratched records…..

Since there is no place large enough
to contain so much happiness,
you shrug, you raise your hands, and it flows out of you
into everything you touch. You are not responsible.
You take no credit, as the night sky takes no credit
for the moon, but continues to hold it, and share it,
and in that way, be known.

-Naomi Shihab Nye

My saint, and a buttonhole.

church, poetry, ,

On June 27th we remember my patron saint, Joanna the Myrrhbearer. She is somewhat well-known among Christians as one of the women who cared for the needs of our Lord during his earthly ministry, and she was blessed to be present at the tomb on the morning of the Resurrection, and to hear the angel say, “Why seek ye the living among the dead?” The angel’s question is one that I have found it helpful to ask myself this year, since Pascha especially.

Today I read this poem by Naomi Shihab Nye on different ways to be famous, and it’s helping me enter into the spirit of my name day. I first read it in an anthology published ten years after the poet’s own collection that includes it, and somehow in my library copy of 180 More Extraordinary Poems for Every Day, selected by Billy Collins, the last two words of the poem had been changed to “did.” The meaning I extract from the one-word ending makes a big difference to me, and I prefer it, but I’m afraid it must have been a typo. I’m glad I read it the “wrong way” first, because it gives me two more possibilities to weigh and reflect on.

FAMOUS

The river is famous to the fish.

The loud voice is famous to silence,
which knew it would inherit the earth
before anybody said so.

The cat sleeping on the fence is famous to the birds
watching him from the birdhouse.

The tear is famous, briefly, to the cheek.

The idea you carry close to your bosom
is famous to your bosom.

The boot is famous to the earth,
more famous than the dress shoe,
which is famous only to floors.

The bent photograph is famous to the one who carries it
and not at all famous to the one who is pictured.

I want to be famous to shuffling men
who smile while crossing streets,
sticky children in grocery lines,
famous as the one who smiled back.

I want to be famous in the way a pulley is famous,
or a buttonhole, not because it did anything spectacular,
but because it never forgot what it could do.

-Naomi Shihab Nye, from Words Under the Words: Selected Poems