Another Poem on My Daughter’s Birthday by Craig Morgan Teicher

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend May 22, 2014   Another Poem on My Daughter’s Birthday   Craig Morgan Teicher

There must be soft words for an evening like this, when the breeze caresses like gentle fingertips all over. I don’t know how not to write darkly and sad. But it’s two years today since my little girl was born, cut safely from the noose. We meant nothing but hope; how near death is to that. Only children, only some children, get to run free from these snags. She was born! She lived and she grows like joy spreading from the syllables of songs. She reminds me of now and now and now.                                  I must learn to have been so lucky.              Copyright @ 2014 by Craig Morgan Teicher. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   “It’s hard to write happy poems, I think. I’ve only partially succeeded—this poem came about as a result of a self-assignment to celebrate something. I celebrate things all the time in my lived life, but I think TV, not poetry, is where we go to feel happy. But I wanted to try to make a happy poem, and there’s no one who makes me happier than my daughter, so I wrote about her.  The poem came out more as a wish for happiness than as happiness itself, but that’s poetry for you.” —Craig Morgan Teicher   Craig Morgan Teicher is the author of three books, most recently To Keep Love Blurry (BOA Editions, 2010) and the chapbook Ambivalence and Other Conundrums (Omnidawn Publishing, 2014). He lives in Brooklyn with his wife and children. Most Recent Book by Teicher   To Keep Love Blurry  (BOA Editions, 2010) “Prayer for a Birthday” by Mark Wunderlich “A Happy Birthday” by Ted Kooser “Morning Song” by Sylvia Plath Poem-a-Day   Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-a-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends. Thanks for being a part of the Academy of American Poets community. To learn about other programs, including National Poetry Month, Poem in Your Pocket Day, the annual Poets Forum, and more, visit Poets.org.   You are receiving this e-mail because you elected to subscribe to our mailing list. If you would like to unsubscribe, please click here.   © Academy of American Poets 75 Maiden Lane, Suite 901, New York, NY 10038