1
Narcissa
Some of the girls are playing jacks.
Some are playing ball.
But small Narcissa is not playing
Anything at all.
Small Narcissa sits upon
A brick in her back yard
And looks at tiger-lilies,
And shakes her pigtails hard.
First she is an ancient queen
In pomp and purple veil.
Soon she is a singing wind.
And, next, a nightingale.
How fine to be Narcissa,
A-changing like all that!
While sitting still, as still, as still
As anyone ever sat!
Gwendolyn Brooks
2
Myrtle
Wearing her yellow rubber slicker,
Myrtle, our journal carrier,
has come early through rain and darkness
to bring us the news.
A woman of thirty or so,
with three small children at home,
she’s told me she likes
a long walk by herself in the morning.
And with pride in her work,
she’s wrapped the news neatly in plastic —
a bread bag, beaded with rain,
that reads WONDER.
From my doorway I watch her
flicker from porch to porch as she goes,
a yellow candle flame
no wind or weather dare extinguish.
Ted Kooser
3
grandmother
if I were to see
her shape from a mile away
i’d know so quickly
that it would be her.
the purple scarf
and the plastic
shopping bag
if I felt
hands on my head
i’d know that those
were her hands
warm and damp
with the smell
of roots
if I heard
a voice
coming from
a rock
i’d know and her words
would flow inside me
like the light
of someone
stirring ashes
from a sleeping fire
at night
Ray A. Young Bear
4
Blackberry Sweet
Black girl black girl
lips as curved as cherries
full as grape bunches
sweet as blackberries
Black girl black girl
when you walk you are
magic as a rising bird
or a falling star
Black girl black girl
what’s your spell to make
the heart in my breast
jump stop shake
Dudley Randall
Poem for S1 Poem for S1
5
While I Slept
While I slept, while I slept and the night grew colder
She would come to my room, stepping softly
And draw a blanket about my shoulder
While I slept.
While I slept, while I slept in the dark, still heat
She would come to my bedside, stepping coolly
And smooth the twisted, troubled sheet
While I slept.
Now she sleeps, sleeps udner quiet rain
While nights grow warm or nights grow colder.
And I wake, and sleep, and wake again
While she sleeps.
Robert Francis
Poem for S1 Poem for S1