The Sunday Poem: Freya Manfred...Swimming With A Hundred Year Old Snapping Turtle

American Life in Poetry: Column 113

BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE, 2004-2006

Though the dog chose domestication, cheerfully enjoying human food and protection, most of the world's species look upon us with justifiable wariness, for we're among the most dangerous critters on the planet. Here Minnesota poet Freya Manfred, while out for a leisurely swim, comes face to face with a species that will not be trained to sit or roll over.


Swimming With A Hundred Year Old Snapping Turtle

I spy his head above the waves,
big as a man�s fist, black eyes peering at me,
until he dives into darker, deeper water.
Yesterday I saw him a foot from my outstretched hand,
already tilting his great domed shell away.
Ribbons of green moss rippled behind him,
growing along the ridge of his back
and down his long reptilian tail.
He swims in everything he knows,
and what he knows is never forgotten.
Wisely, he fears me as if I were the Plague,
which I am, sick unto death, swimming
to heal myself in his primeval sea.

Reprinted by permission of Freya Manfred, whose most recent book is "My Only Home," 2003, from Red Dragonfly Press. Poem copyright © 2006 by Freya Manfred. This weekly column is supported by The Poetry Foundation, The Library of Congress, and the Department of English at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. This column does not accept unsolicited poetry.

Sunday Wallpaper: Black-Crowned Night-Heron

SOUTH BOSQUE BIKE TRAIL--We saw this bird and took its picture. It wasn't until we got home that I could identify it. The night-heron, grouped between the Egrets and Bitterns in my field book, is a definite match.

The Sunday Poem: Elizabeth Hobbs... Slow Dancing on the Highway: the Trip North

American Life in Poetry: Column 112

BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE, 2004-2006

Not only do we have road rage, but it seems we have road love, too. Here Elizabeth Hobbs of Maine offers us a two-car courtship. Be careful with whom you choose to try this little dance.

Slow Dancing on the Highway:
the Trip North

You follow close behind me,
for a thousand miles responsive to my movements.
I signal, you signal back. We will meet at the next exit.

You blow kisses, which I return.
You mouth "I love you," a message for my rearview mirror.

We do a slow tango as we change lanes in tandem,
gracefully, as though music were guiding us.
It is tighter than bodies locked in heat,
this caring, this ardent watching.

Poem copyright © 2001 by Elizabeth Hobbs, whose most recent book is "A Craving for the Goatman," Goose River Press, 2003. Reprinted from "Poems from the Lake," Goose River Press, 2001, with permission of the publisher. This weekly column is supported by The Poetry Foundation, The Library of Congress, and the Department of English at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. This column does not accept unsolicited poetry.

Bill Richardson's TV Ads Stun Wonkette...Make Everybody Else Smile

NOB HILL--Wonkette seems confused, but her readers loved 'em...just read the comments below the video. I'm talking about the new commercials Bill Richardson is showing in Iowa. You can view them right here. What do you think?

By the way, according to The Two Kates, these ads got more hits than any other videos in webdom for a 24-hour period when they were just released.

Riding the Singing Wire Home

NOB HILL--Sometimes life is so perfect no words are necessary. Oh Sweet New Mexico!

The Sunday Poem: Juliana Gray...Summer Downpour on Campus (What a delight!)

American Life in Poetry: Column 110

BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE, 2004-2006

I've talked a lot in this column about poetry as celebration, about the way in which a poem can make an ordinary experience seem quite special. Here's the celebration of a moment on a campus somewhere, anywhere. The poet is Juliana Gray, who lives in New York. I especially like the little comic surprise with which it closes.


Summer Downpour on Campus

When clouds turn heavy, rich
and mottled as an oyster bed,

when the temperature drops so fast
that fog conjures itself inside the cars,
as if the parking lots were filled
with row upon row of lovers,

when my umbrella veils my face
and threatens to reverse itself
at every gust of wind, and rain
lashes my legs and the hem of my skirt,

but I am walking to meet a man
who'll buy me coffee and kiss my fingers—

what can be more beautiful, then,
than these boys sprinting through the storm,
laughing, shouldering the rain aside,
running to their dorms, perhaps to class,
carrying, like torches, their useless shoes?

Reprinted from "The Louisville Review," (No. 59, Spring 2006) by permission of the author. Copyright © 2006 by Juliana Gray, whose most recent book of poetry is "The Man Under My Skin," River City Publishing, 2005. This weekly column is supported by The Poetry Foundation, The Library of Congress, and the Department of English at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. This column does not accept unsolicited poetry.