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Four poems by Kay Ryan on her birthday
The Edges of Time, Nothing Ventured, Miser Time, Paired Things
The Edges of Time
It is at the edges
that time
thins.
Time which had been
dense and viscous
as amber suspending
intentions like bees
unseizes them. A
humming begins,
apparently
coming
from stacks of
put-off things or
just in back. A
racket
of claims now,
as time flattens. A
glittering fan of things
competing to happen,
brilliant and urgent
as fish when seas
retreat.
Nothing Ventured
Nothing exists as a block
and cannot be parceled up.
So if nothing’s ventured
it’s not just talk;
it’s the big wager.
Don’t you wonder
how people think
the banks of space
and time don’t matter?
How they’ll drain
the big tanks down to
slime and salamanders
and want thanks?
Miser Time
Miser time grows
profligate near the
end: unpinching
and unplanning,
abandoning the
whole idea of
savings. It’s hard
to understand
but time apparently
expands with its
diminishing. The
door thrown wide
on sliding hills of high-
denomination bills and
nothing much to buy.
Paired Things
Who, who had only seen wings,
could extrapolate the
skinny sticks of things
birds use for land,
the backward way they bend,
the silly way they stand?
And who, only studying
birdtracks in the sand,
could think those little forks
had decamped on the wind?
So many paired things seem odd.
Who ever would have dreamed
the broad winged raven of despair
would quit the air and go
bandylegged upon the ground,
a common crow?
Kay Ryan
Kay Ryan is an American poet and the 16th poet laureate of the United States. She first began publishing poems in 1983, but only in the mid-1990s did her work receive serious recognition, after her poems began to appear in anthologies and national reviews published critical reviews of her work. Her reception of the prestigious Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize in 2004 marked her entrance into the short list of excellent poets writing in English. Her poems are noted for their terse, concise and deeply metaphysical observations—often tweaking logic and cliches with unexpected and witty results. She has been compared favorably in both style and substance to Emily Dickinson and Marianne Moore. She celebrated her 78th birthday on September 21.
Here's something you might be interested in.
Four poems by Kay Ryan on her birthday
The Edges of Time, Nothing Ventured, Miser Time, Paired Things
Four poems by Kay Ryan on her birthday
The Edges of Time, Nothing Ventured, Miser Time, Paired Things
The Edges of Time
It is at the edges
that time
thins.
Time which had been
dense and viscous
as amber suspending
intentions like bees
unseizes them. A
humming begins,
apparently
coming
from stacks of
put-off things or
just in back. A
racket
of claims now,
as time flattens. A
glittering fan of things
competing to happen,
brilliant and urgent
as fish when seas
retreat.
Nothing Ventured
Nothing exists as a block
and cannot be parceled up.
So if nothing’s ventured
it’s not just talk;
it’s the big wager.
Don’t you wonder
how people think
the banks of space
and time don’t matter?
How they’ll drain
the big tanks down to
slime and salamanders
and want thanks?
Miser Time
Miser time grows
profligate near the
end: unpinching
and unplanning,
abandoning the
whole idea of
savings. It’s hard
to understand
but time apparently
expands with its
diminishing. The
door thrown wide
on sliding hills of high-
denomination bills and
nothing much to buy.
Paired Things
Who, who had only seen wings,
could extrapolate the
skinny sticks of things
birds use for land,
the backward way they bend,
the silly way they stand?
And who, only studying
birdtracks in the sand,
could think those little forks
had decamped on the wind?
So many paired things seem odd.
Who ever would have dreamed
the broad winged raven of despair
would quit the air and go
bandylegged upon the ground,
a common crow?
Kay Ryan
Kay Ryan is an American poet and the 16th poet laureate of the United States. She first began publishing poems in 1983, but only in the mid-1990s did her work receive serious recognition, after her poems began to appear in anthologies and national reviews published critical reviews of her work. Her reception of the prestigious Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize in 2004 marked her entrance into the short list of excellent poets writing in English. Her poems are noted for their terse, concise and deeply metaphysical observations—often tweaking logic and cliches with unexpected and witty results. She has been compared favorably in both style and substance to Emily Dickinson and Marianne Moore. She celebrated her 78th birthday on September 21.
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