American Life in Poetry: Column 499
BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE
To celebrate my 75th year, I’ve published a new book of poems, and many of them are about the way in which we come together to help each other through the world. Here’s just one: Two
On a parking lot staircase
I met two fine-looking men
descending, both in slacks
and dress shirts, neckties
much alike, one of the men
in his sixties, the other
a good twenty years older,
unsteady on his polished shoes,
a son and his father, I knew
from their looks, the son with his
right hand on the handrail,
the father, left hand on the left,
and in the middle they were
holding hands, and when I neared,
they opened the simple gate
of their interwoven fingers
to let me pass, then reached out
for each other and continued on.
|
No comments:
Post a Comment