If a life needn’t be useful to be meaningful, Then maybe a life of sunbathing on a beach Can be thought of as meaningful for at least a few, The few, say, who view the sun as a god And consider basking a form of worship. As for those devoted to partnership with a surfboard Or a pair of ice skates or a bag of
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A Landscape
This painting of a barn and barnyard near sundown May be enough to suggest we don’t have to turn From the visible world to the invisible In order to grasp the truth of things. We don’t always have to distrust appearances. Not if we’re patient. Not if we’re willing To wait for the sun to reach the angle When whatever it touches, however retiring, Feels invited to step forward Into a moment that might seem to us Familiar if we gave ourselves more often To the task of witnessing. Now to witness A barn and barnyard on a day of rest When the usual veil of dust and smoke Is lifted a moment and things appear To resemble closely what in fact they are.
From Night School by Carl Dennis, published by Penguin Poets, an imprint of Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House, LLC. Copyright © 2018 by Carl Dennis. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on December 26, 2017, by the Academy of American Poets.
From Night School by Carl Dennis, published by Penguin Poets, an imprint of Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House, LLC. Copyright © 2018 by Carl Dennis. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on December 26, 2017, by the Academy of American Poets.
Carl Dennis
Carl Dennis was born on September 17, 1939, in St. Louis, Missouri, and attended both Oberlin College and the University of Chicago before completing his bachelor’s degree at the University of Minnesota. He earned his PhD from the University of California, Berkeley.