Friday Poem

Lament for the Makers
.

Not bird not badger not beaver not bee

Many creatures must
make, but only one must seek

within itself what to make

My father’s ring was a B with a dart
through it, in diamonds against polished black stone.

I have it. What parents leave you
is their lives.

Until my mother died she struggled to make
a house that she did not loathe; paintings; poems; me.

Many creatures must

make, but only one must seek
within itself what to make

Not bird not badger not beaver not bee

Teach me, masters who by making were
remade, your art.
.

by Frank Bidart
from Star Dust
Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005