BY ELANA MARGOT SANTANA Yesterday I found a salamander resting or dying in my garden. Translucent blood red skin with yellow speckles, big black bulging eyes...
Tag: Death
The Expression of a Better World – Anaïs Nin on Transience and the Painful, Familiar Beauty of Music
Anaïs Nin on music, mortality, and what it is to glimpse a joyful vision of a land from which we came and which we have forgotten.
Marie Howe – Death, the last visit
Marie Howe's different, highly sexual vision of transitioning out of life through a double-take on 'la petite morte,' the experience of orgasm as 'a little death.'
John O’Donohue – Beannacht / Blessing
This beautiful poem by John O'Donohue, whose title means 'blessing', is addressed to his mother, Josie.
Emily Dickinson – I Died for Beauty, But Was Scarce…
Emily Dickinson's allegorical reflection on the relationship between beauty and truth.
Tishani Doshi – Hope is the Thing
Tishani Doshi's poem pays homage to a twelve-year-old girl who died of exhaustion last year during the Covid-19 lockdown.
Malignant – A Love Story
BY CYNDY CENDAGORTA As her friend fell sick while she fell in love, she realized we don't get to choose our miracles or our malignancies.
Jericho Brown – Bullet Points
Jericho Brown's poem talks to the weight carried by black Americans who live under the constant threat of police violence and injustice.
Adrienne Rich – The Corpse-Plant
The corpse-plant's soft and scaly appearance and its drooping head give it a ghostly, deathly air in Adrienne Rich's poem.
The Buddha’s Last Teaching: Be Your Own Island, Your Own Refuge
The Buddha's final words of advice to his students before he died were to take refuge in the dharma and in themselves.