Billy Collins, former poet laureate, wrote “The Names” in the wake of September 11 and read it during a special joint session of Congress in New York on September 6, 2002.<\/p>\n
This is what poets laureate are for.<\/p>\n
The Names<\/b><\/p>\n
Yesterday, I lay awake in the palm of the night.
\nA soft rain stole in, unhelped by any breeze,
\nAnd when I saw the silver glaze on the windows,
\nI started with A, with Ackerman, as it happened,
\nThen Baxter and Calabro,
\nDavis and Eberling, names falling into place
\nAs droplets fell through the dark.
\nNames printed on the ceiling of the night.
\nNames slipping around a watery bend.
\nTwenty-six willows on the banks of a stream.
\nIn the morning, I walked out barefoot
\nAmong thousands of flowers
\nHeavy with dew like the eyes of tears,
\nAnd each had a name —
\nFiori inscribed on a yellow petal
\nThen Gonzalez and Han, Ishikawa and Jenkins.
\nNames written in the air
\nAnd stitched into the cloth of the day.
\nA name under a photograph taped to a mailbox.
\nMonogram on a torn shirt,
\nI see you spelled out on storefront windows
\nAnd on the bright unfurled awnings of this city.
\nI say the syllables as I turn a corner —
\nKelly and Lee,
\nMedina, Nardella, and O’Connor.
\nWhen I peer into the woods,
\nI see a thick tangle where letters are hidden
\nAs in a puzzle concocted for children.
\nParker and Quigley in the twigs of an ash,
\nRizzo, Schubert, Torres, and Upton,
\nSecrets in the boughs of an ancient maple.
\nNames written in the pale sky.
\nNames rising in the updraft amid buildings.
\nNames silent in stone
\nOr cried out behind a door.
\nNames blown over the earth and out to sea.
\nIn the evening — weakening light, the last swallows.
\nA boy on a lake lifts his oars.
\nA woman by a window puts a match to a candle,
\nAnd the names are outlined on the rose clouds —
\nVanacore and Wallace,
\n(let X stand, if it can, for the ones unfound)
\nThen Young and Ziminsky, the final jolt of Z.
\nNames etched on the head of a pin.
\nOne name spanning a bridge, another undergoing a tunnel.
\nA blue name needled into the skin.
\nNames of citizens, workers, mothers and fathers,
\nThe bright-eyed daughter, the quick son.
\nAlphabet of names in a green field.
\nNames in the small tracks of birds.
\nNames lifted from a hat
\nOr balanced on the tip of the tongue.
\nNames wheeled into the dim warehouse of memory.
\nSo many names, there is barely room on the walls of the heart.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Billy Collins, former poet laureate, wrote “The Names” in the wake of September 11 and read it during a special joint session of Congress in New York on September 6, 2002. This is what poets laureate are for. The Names … Continue reading