Blessing the Boats by Lucille Clifton may the tide that is entering even now the lip of our understanding carry you out beyond the face of fear may you kiss the wind then turn from it certain that it will love your back may you open your eyes to water water waving forever and may you in your innocence sail through this to that You can find this poem in Blessing the Boats: New and Selected Poems 1988-2000.
Lucille Clifton
Evening Poetry, June 18
still there is mercy, there is grace
by Lucille Clifton
how otherwise
could i have come to this
marble spinning in space
propelled by the great
thumb of the universe?
how otherwise
could the two roads
of this tongue
converge into a single
certitude?
how otherwise
could i, a sleek old
traveler,
curl one day safe and still
beside You
at Your feet, perhaps,
but, amen, Yours.
You can find this poem in the collection Book of Light.
Evening Poetry, June 14
gloria mundi
by Lucille Clifton
so knowing,
what is known?
that we carry our baggage
in our cupped hands
when we burst through
the waters of our mother.
that some are born
and some are brought
to the glory of this world.
that it is more difficult
than faith
to serve only one calling
one commitment
one devotion
in one life.
You can find this poem in the collection The Book of Light.
Evening Poetry, May 22
homage to my hips
by Lucille Clifton
these hips are big hips
they need space to
move around in.
they don’t fit into little
pretty places. these hips
are free hips.
they don’t like to be held back.
these hips have never been enslaved,
they go where they want to go
they do what they want to do.
these hips are mighty hips.
these hips are magic hips.
I have known them
to put a spell on a man and
spin him like a top.
You can find this poem in Penguin’s Anthology of 20th Century American Poetry.
Life of Kim 