The Hard Work of Real Human Beings

For the next half of National Poetry Month 2017, 

Malvina will Sing It, and I'll write a poem in response.

Through her music, Malvina addressed issues of diversity and collaboration, as well as economic and labor issues.

The Hard Work of Real Human Beings

Where do cherries come from?
They come from a tree!
And who picks them one by one?
Neither you, nor me.

Where does asparagus come from?
It grows in a field!
And who stoops down to cut each stalk?
Neither you, nor me.

Where do apples come from?
They grow on a tree!
And which strong worker fills buckets all day?
Neither you, nor me.

Where do peppers come from?
On bushes, low and green!
And who must pick each single one?
Neither you, nor me.

How much money do they make?
Do they have the things they need?
Who values their important work?
Neither you, nor me.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017

4 Labor-Intensive Crops Farmers Wish They Had Robots to Harvest

I Live in a City

For the next half of National Poetry Month 2017, 

Malvina will Sing It, and I'll write a poem in response.

Through her music, Malvina addressed issues of diversity and collaboration, as well as economic and labor issues. 

Riddle Poem

What is bigger than all its parts,
full to the brim of stops and starts,
more colorful than the boldest rainbow,
only silent when buried in snow,
less significant than it wants you to believe,
a problem to solve, a tragedy to grieve?

("...a city made by human hands")

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017

Rain

For the next half of National Poetry Month 2017, 

Malvina will Sing It, and I'll write a poem in response.

Another unifying topic in Malvina Reynolds' songs is the environment. The next few days will feature songs written in the 1960's and 1970's, but which are fresh and topical today.

Ode to an Inch of Life-Giving Rain

Oh, Rain!
You fall so abundantly further east
but we treasure every hundredth of an inch
here on the western high plains.

Oh, Rain!
You have rescued the wheat crop,
not to mention the Russian Olives
in the windbreak on the north side of the house.

Oh, Rain!
You lift every spirit.
Are your ears burning? The inch that fell last night
is the topic of every conversation at the post office.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017

The World's Gone Beautiful

For the next half of National Poetry Month 2017, 

Malvina will Sing It, and I'll write a poem in response.

Another unifying topic in Malvina Reynolds' songs is the environment. The next few days will feature songs written in the 1960's and 1970's, but which are fresh and topical today.

The World is Asking Not to Die

The world is asking not to die,
yet humans look away,

overpopulating the planet,
changing the climate past the point of repair,
destroying biodiversity in a mass extinction,
killing oxygen-producing phytoplankton with nitrogen runoff,
polluting fresh water sources,
acidifying the ocean,
contaminating air, water, and soil with plastics and chemical compounds,
depleting the ozone layer,
clearing forests at an alarming rate.

How can humans look away
from a world that is asking not to die?

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017

Skagit Valley Forever

For the next half of National Poetry Month 2017, 

Malvina will Sing It, and I'll write a poem in response.

Another unifying topic in Malvina Reynolds' songs is the environment. The next few days will feature songs written in the 1960's and 1970's, but which are fresh and topical today.

wild is worth saving --
find your own Skagit Valley --
fight for our future --

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017

Regrets

For the next half of National Poetry Month 2017, 

Malvina will Sing It, and I'll write a poem in response.

Another unifying topic in Malvina Reynolds' songs is the environment. The next few days will feature songs written in the 1960's and 1970's, but which are fresh and topical today.

Today's poem is a Golden Shovel. The last word in each of my lines reads down, like an acrostic, and is a line from today's song by Malvina Reynolds, "Let it Be." Last month, I buried the story of the loss of two beautiful and magical places inside a book review, and when I set out to write today's poem, it became a lament of the most recent replacement of magic with convenience. Clearly, I'm not over that yet.

Regrets

You do the best you can until you

can do no more. You think

about the choices that

you made and you

wonder if your love

could ever have been enough for her

survival. You planted and

weeded and you

hoped someone else would want

to become caretaker to

this magical place where kids could discover

the workings of nature -- how

intricately she's

designed -- made

with milkweed, for example, expressly so

there can be monarchs. Because you

loved that plot, you take

it personally that they leveled her

and undid all your work; took apart

a piece of what made this world good and

right, wild and free. Your regrets threaten to break

 your belief in yourself, but her

 beauty remains whole in your heart.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017

Sing It, Malvina!

April 1 -- Working for Change
April 2 -- A Lifetime Filled With Change
April 3 -- Red
April 4 -- Little Red Hen
April 5 -- Childhood Dreams
April 6 -- Lonely Child
April 7 -- Quiet

April 8 -- Storyteller
April 9 -- Troublemaker
April 10 -- Girl Power
April 11 -- Choices
April 12 -- My Gal, Mother Nature
April 13 -- Not a Joke
April 14 -- I Don't Mind Failing

April 15 -- What is Feminism?

April 16 -- Holes

April 17 -- They Can Have Their Cake and Eat it, Too

April 18 -- We Won't Be Nice

April 19 -- Grass is Persistent

April 20 -- Ticky Tacky

April 21 -- Regrets

Tabatha has the Poetry Friday Roundup this week at The Opposite of Indifference.

Ticky Tacky

For the next half of National Poetry Month 2017, 

Malvina will Sing It, and I'll write a poem in response.

One of the strongest unifying topics in Malvina Reynolds' songs is politics and protest. The next few days will feature songs written in the 1960's and 1970's, but which are fresh and topical today.

Ticky Tacky
(to the tune of "Little Boxes")

It’s the sameness, lack-of-change-ness
It’s the absence of diversity
Economic inequality
Absolute conformity

It’s a boilermaker
Never varying
So redundant
Truly tedious

It’s the absence of diversity
And it all looks just the same.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017

Grass Is Persistent

For the second half of National Poetry Month 2017, 

Malvina will Sing It, and I'll write a poem in response.

One of the strongest unifying topics in Malvina Reynolds' songs is politics and protest. The next few days will feature songs written in the 1960's and 1970's, but which are fresh and topical today.

Grass Is

People want to tame me or
Eradicate me. They underestimate my
Root
Structure and my
Indomitable
Spirit. I am
Tenacious. I
Exist
Not to please, but to break concrete and spread
Truth.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017

We Won't Be Nice

For the second half of National Poetry Month 2017, 

Malvina will Sing It, and I'll write a poem in response.

One of the strongest unifying topics in Malvina Reynolds' songs is politics and protest. The next few days will feature songs written in the 1960's and 1970's, but which are fresh and topical today.

We Won’t Be Nice

Cause a disruption
Form an obstruction
March and rally and chant.

Shake up the status quo
Make a line and block the flow
March and rally and chant.

Rebel with civility
Abstain from docility
March and rally and chant.


©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017

They Can Have Their Cake, and Eat it, Too

For the second half of National Poetry Month 2017, 

Malvina will Sing It, and I'll write a poem in response.

One of the strongest unifying topics in Malvina Reynolds' songs is politics and protest. The next few days will feature songs written in the 1960's and 1970's, but which are fresh and topical today.

Let Them Eat Cake was recorded live in concert, November 1972.




They Can Have Their Cake, and Eat it, Too

They sugar coat the truth for us,
fake the daily news,
make us look the other way.
What could they possibly lose?

They divert to keep the facts at bay,
disguise false validations,
sweeten fibs with taradiddles,
no need for vindication.

“What could we possibly lose?” they ask,
on the brink of a nuclear war.
They’re blind to even the simplest truths,
and deaf to our uproar.


©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017