USA

lpweiss@earthlink.net

Praise Song to Myself

I died twice, visited
hospital beds
as a child holding bouquets of flowers.
I come to tell you what is on my lips,
Oh yeah.

My parents left early,
I made everything up myself
with a pair of arches
I kept walking.

There was no one around to tell
me what to do or how to do it,
I wouldn’t have listened anyway.
What is on my lips, Oh yeah, Oh yeah.

I invited pain, the stranger,
into my house. No I didn’t
turn it away into the street
where it would get twisted and ugly.

Before pain left,
it gave me the gift of strength.
Oh yeah. What is on my lips.

I wandered up and down two seacoasts
looking for love,
pretending I wanted experience.

I listened to people
who knew how to talk incessantly
about themselves,
what they were going to buy tomorrow.

I looked for Walt Whitman’s America
in factories and picket lines.
What is on my lips.

I believed in justice,
a card-carrying member,
Oh yeah, Oh yeah.

I visited poets
who believed in me
before I knew how to believe in myself.
Oh yeah, Oh yeah.

I turned inside out
each time I gave birth.
Oh yeah.

I found love with a man who
also had befriended pain.
What is on my lips.

 

© Copyright, Lenore Weiss.
All Rights Reserved. Printed By Permission.