And The Days are Not Full Enough by Ezra Pound & Other Poems

AND THE DAYS ARE NOT FULL ENOUGH

By Ezra Pound

And the days are not full enough

and the nights are not full enough

and life slips by like a field mouse

not shaking the grass.

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A BIRD

By Sheila Wingfield

Unexplained

in the salt meadow

lay the dead bird.

The wind

was fluttering its wings.

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HOW TO KILL A LIVING THING

By Eibhlin Nic Eochaidh

Neglect it.

Criticize it to its face.

Say how it kills the light,

traps all the rubbish,

bores you with its green.

Continually

harden your heart,

then

cut it down close

to the root as possible.

Forget it

for a week or a month.

Return with an axe.

Split it with one blow.

Insert a stone

to keep the wound wide open.

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All poems are from: "Good Poems for Hard Times" edited by Garrison Keiller