Day 62

Unless you believe in the eye of the needle

this kind of poverty will never be about material

 

it won't be about ragged clothing

or mud huts with broken walls

or river blindness

or murram roads

or bad-humoured fields that hoard curses

& promises that there won't be a harvest

this year or next year or ever

 

this isn't the poverty of sleep

or for that matter dreams

 

this is my deep loss

my poverty

 

he will never touch my hand again

he will never touch my hand

Grade levels
10-12 / Sec. 4 & 5 / CEGEP 1
Tags
Death
Family
Time
War
Moods
Loving
Tender
Torn
Common Poetic Terms and Forms
Elegy
Imagery
Repetition
Rhythm
Sensory Language
Contest Criteria
25 Lines or Fewer
Canada
Bibliographical info

Juliane Okot Bitek, “Day 62” from 100 Days. Copyright © 2016 by Juliane Okot Bitek. Reprinted by permission of the University of Alberta Press.

Source: 100 Days (University of Alberta Press, 2016)

Natalie Diaz

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my own eye when I am weeping,

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i wanted bitumen to be made of dead dinosaurs. why did i want these

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It’s the first day of summer and we’re so happy

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All those dark kilometres. The sky is so blue

And the sea is blue and the small islands in the sea

Sue Goyette

Eight

The trick to building houses was making sure 

they didn’t taste good. The ocean’s culinary taste 

was growing more sophisticated and occasionally 

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