National Poetry Month 2020 Day 28: “A Brief for the Defense” & “Destination”
Is joy a good or necessary thing? Is happiness somehow bad, evil, or unworthy? This is not a
comprehensive study, just a couple brief poetic ideas about whether it is right to enjoy life.
A Brief for the Defense
By Jack Gilbert
Sorrow everywhere. Slaughter everywhere. If babies
are not starving someplace, they are starving
somewhere else. With flies in their nostrils.
But we enjoy our lives because that's what God wants.
Otherwise the mornings before summer dawn would not
be made so fine. The Bengal tiger would not
be fashioned so miraculously well. The poor women
at the fountain are laughing together between
the suffering they have known and the awfulness
in their future, smiling and laughing while somebody
in the village is very sick. There is laughter
every day in the terrible streets of Calcutta,
and the women laugh in the cages of Bombay.
If we deny our happiness, resist our satisfaction,
we lessen the importance of their deprivation.
We must risk delight. We can do without pleasure,
but not delight. Not enjoyment. We must have
the stubbornness to accept our gladness in the ruthless
furnace of this world. To make injustice the only
measure of our attention is to praise the Devil.
If the locomotive of the Lord runs us down,
we should give thanks that the end had magnitude.
We must admit there will be music despite everything.
We stand at the prow again of a small ship
anchored late at night in the tiny port
looking over to the sleeping island: the waterfront
is three shuttered cafés and one naked light burning.
To hear the faint sound of oars in the silence as a rowboat
comes slowly out and then goes back is truly worth
all the years of sorrow that are to come.
Destination
by Blythe Stephens
Out my door
Down the stairs
Across the grass
Across the street
Across the bridge (bridge!)
Listen to water…
More street
Near the light control box change-
Ka-thunk!
I pass churches on my way,
Two of them.
If they knew my destination,
They would probably think
I am headed
Straight for hell.
Another street, wet grass
Up stairs in a little apartment house
#4
knock
Find myself inside
heaven.
A Brief for the Defense
By Jack Gilbert
Sorrow everywhere. Slaughter everywhere. If babies
are not starving someplace, they are starving
somewhere else. With flies in their nostrils.
But we enjoy our lives because that's what God wants.
Otherwise the mornings before summer dawn would not
be made so fine. The Bengal tiger would not
be fashioned so miraculously well. The poor women
at the fountain are laughing together between
the suffering they have known and the awfulness
in their future, smiling and laughing while somebody
in the village is very sick. There is laughter
every day in the terrible streets of Calcutta,
and the women laugh in the cages of Bombay.
If we deny our happiness, resist our satisfaction,
we lessen the importance of their deprivation.
We must risk delight. We can do without pleasure,
but not delight. Not enjoyment. We must have
the stubbornness to accept our gladness in the ruthless
furnace of this world. To make injustice the only
measure of our attention is to praise the Devil.
If the locomotive of the Lord runs us down,
we should give thanks that the end had magnitude.
We must admit there will be music despite everything.
We stand at the prow again of a small ship
anchored late at night in the tiny port
looking over to the sleeping island: the waterfront
is three shuttered cafés and one naked light burning.
To hear the faint sound of oars in the silence as a rowboat
comes slowly out and then goes back is truly worth
all the years of sorrow that are to come.
Destination
by Blythe Stephens
Out my door
Down the stairs
Across the grass
Across the street
Across the bridge (bridge!)
Listen to water…
More street
Near the light control box change-
Ka-thunk!
I pass churches on my way,
Two of them.
If they knew my destination,
They would probably think
I am headed
Straight for hell.
Another street, wet grass
Up stairs in a little apartment house
#4
knock
Find myself inside
heaven.
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