Poetry Crisis Valentines 2022

Poetry Crisis Valentines 2022

Alexander Pope
Violets are blue,
roses are red,
let us rush in
where angels won’t tread.

Jenny Joseph
Roses are red,
violets are blue.
When I’m an old woman
I’ll dress like that too.

Elizabeth Bishop
Roses are found
on vines interlacing.
It’s not hard to master
the art of misplacing.

Gregory Corso
Exlposives are deadly,
violence is loud.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Can I get you a shroud?

Mark Strand
Roses are red,
violets are blue,
air is an obstacle
that we walk through.

Alberto Rios
Roses are red,
violets are blue,
the border is what
separates me from you.

James W. Hall
Woses aww wed,
but what makes me blue
is I’m SPIDERMAN.
Aww you SPIDERMAN too?

Maya Angelou
Roses are red,
violets are blue,
still I rise. Can I get
a rise out of you?

Alberto Rios calls the Poetry Crisis Line

COUNSELOR: Poetry Crisis Line, what is your emergency?

CALLER: The border is a line that birds cannot see.

COUNSELOR: You mean like a window?

CALLER: The border is a beautiful piece of paper folded carelessly in half.

COUNSELOR: Oh—so these birds you mentioned—are they origami cranes?

CALLER: The border is where flint first met steel,

COUNSELOR: Oh no. How far along are you on the paper cranes? Were you going for the traditional thousand?

CALLER: starting a century of fires.

COUNSELOR: Oh.

 

 

Read the rest of “The Border” by Alberto Rios here.