Luck Is a Star

Quang Ho

Luck is a star.

Money is a plaything.

Time is a storyteller.

And the sky goes blue with mornings.

And the sky goes bronze with sunsets.

And the fireborn - they go far -

Being at home in fire.

Carl Sandburg 

 Sandburg throws down this "something-is-something else" with such ease. "Luck is a star"? Okay, if he means something far away and beautiful that we dream of reaching, I can follow. "Money is a plaything", yes, money is like that, something we use and move around and pass and receive it very much as we would pieces in a game. And also, a plaything, not the deep-down stuff of life (in spite of all talk to the contrary). "Time is a storyteller", that's the best one. So full of thoughts and ideas - I could chew on it a good while. How Time spins stories, how it uses the sky as a backdrop for its drama. Sky goes blue, sky goes bronze; Sandburg makes such sweeping word/image gestures it knocks me back. And then the kicker - "the fireborn" - with just one word, how he changes us! We're not put-upon, victims of fate or chance, we're the Fireborn. We're characters in this story. Above us, the sky changes colour, the stars call us, the money moves from hand to hand, and we are tested by fire. What will it prove us to be? How far will we go? Only Time, the storyteller, knows.

 

To the Light of September

Annie Soudain

To the Light of September

When you are already here

you appear to be only

a name that tells of you

whether you are present or not

and for now it seems as though

you are still summer

still the high familiar

endless summer

yet with a glint

of bronze in the chill mornings

and the late yellow petals

of the mullein fluttering

on the stalks that lean

over their broken

shadows across the cracked ground

but they all know

that you have come

the seed heads of the sage

the whispering birds

with nowhere to hide you

to keep you for later

you

who fly with them

you who are neither

before nor after

you who arrive

with blue plums

that have fallen through the night

perfect in the dew

W.S. Merwin


I like how the poem is addressed to the light as if it were a person. "For now it seems as though you are still summer...But they all know that you have come." And isn't it true? I was sitting in the sun this afternoon and for a moment it could've been August. But even though the leaves haven't turned, there's an unmistakable feeling in the air. It's no longer summer. You have arrived.