William carlos williams to waken an old lady

I saw two trees embracing.

One leaned on the other as if to throw her down.

But she was the upright one.

Since their twin youth, maybe she had been pulling him toward her

all that time, and finally almost uprooted him.

He was the thin, dry, insecure one, the most wind-warped, you could see.

And where their tops tangled it looked like he was crying on her shoulder.

On the other hand, maybe he had been trying to weaken her, break her, or at least make her bend

over backwards for him just a little bit.

And all that time she was standing up to him the best she could.

She was the most stubborn, the straightest one, that's a fact.

But he had been willing to change himself—even if it was for the worse—all that time.

At the top, they looked like one tree, where they were embracing.

It was plain they'd be always together.

Too late now to part.

When the wind blew, you could hear them rubbing on each other.

Introduction to Poetry- Billy Collins

I ask them to take a poem and hold it up to the light like a color slide or press an ear against its hive.

I say drop a mouse into a poem and watch him probe his way out, or walk inside the poem's room

and feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to waterski across the surface of a poem waving at the author's name on the shore.

But all they want to do is tie the poem to a chair with rope and torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hose to find out what it really means.

To Waken an Old Lady - Poem by William Carlos Williams

Old age is a flight of small cheeping birds skimming bare trees above a snow glaze.

Gaining and failing they are buffeted by a dark wind --

But what?

On harsh weed stalks the flock has rested -- the snow is covered with broken seed husks and the wind tempered with a shrill piping of plenty.

Acquainted with the Night-- Robert Frost

I have been one acquainted with the night.

I have walked out in rain—and back in rain.

I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.

I have passed by the watchman on his beat and dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet When far away an interrupted cry

Came over houses from another street, but not to call me back or say good-bye; And further still at an unearthly height, One luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right I have been one acquain