Poetry Friday: The Early Bird

Still dark, and raining hard

on a cold May morning

and yet the early bird

is out there chirping,

chirping its sweet-sour

wooden-pulley notes,

pleased, it would seem,

to be given work,

hauling the heavy bucket of dawn

up from the darkness,

note over note,

and letting us drink.

                    --Ted Kooser

(Oh, Ted. I love you so.)
 

You can find more totally lovable poets (and their poems) over at Live Your Poem where Irene is hosting today. 

Poetry Friday: Dishwater

Slap of the screen door, flat knock
of my grandmother's boxy black shoes
on the wooden stoop, the hush and sweep
of her knob-kneed, cotton-aproned stride
out to the edge and then, toed in
with a furious twist and heave,
a bridge that leaps from her hot red hands
and hangs there shining for fifty years
over the mystified chickens,
over the swaying nettles, the ragweed,
the clay slope down to the creek,
over the redwing blackbirds in the tops
of the willows, a glorious rainbow
with an empty dishpan swinging at one end.

                -- Ted Kooser

I think Dishwater is one of the BEST POEMS EVER. To find some other candidates, stride on over to Teaching Authors where JoAnn is hosting today.