A few poems Maine Gov. Janet Mills wrote over the years
By The Associated Press on February 13, 2023.
Maine’s Democratic Gov. Janet Mills said poems “elevate our soul.” Here are a few that she has written over the years: “For My Granddaughter” (2016) Men running for office Bellow about the future, Punch the air, Wave their arms, Yell on the tv. While in the delivery room, It is the fist you notice first, The quiet fingerlets That cling to one another With invisible strength Clutching their own new skin, forming a circle Only she understands. Then the face, wrinkly, The little body, A sturdy belly, knees and feet in miniature. Eyes and ears Ready to know Everything that is new, Everything that is. A brain ready To learn, A heart ready To love. That is your god Warming your own heart, That is your god holding your hand So tight, Never letting you Go. “Every government Ought to have A Department of the Future,” Kurt Vonnegut said. And here, she is. Clenching all our Tomorrows. – “For Stan” (2015) There are things I have seen I cannot explain ““ The way a child cries and laughs At things only it knows. The way autumn always brings the smell of fries and donuts, musty hay, the baying of old animals, the carnies and barkers, the crowd in the grandstand shouting with a single voice, the chill of a new wind. The way spring brings everything back we’ve Sheltered all the long dark days – Grass in the field, water in the stream, hope in the heart. And the way a dying person sometimes has one last good day. Our friend Harry had one last good day. In deep coma, it was the end, they said, as they pulled the tubes, and he awoke with a smile. And when you and I went to say goodbye, He was having the best party, Telling such stories with his Firefighter friends, his wife, his neighbors, Before he died. There are other things, Like red lights in the sky That twice appeared when I was on An old road on a dark night. Like the music we heard at the lake That came from swift bats, tall trees, naked loons at dusk. Like the man lost three days in deep woods, given up for dead, who Walked out, following the river To the trail. Like the time I found you, love, and two lives changed. Like you, when we came to say goodbye. Laughing like lightning, You knew us, you saw us, you held us, And thanked us, every one, knowing it was the end. And like me now holding in my hands your old smile, missing that music, looking, following the river to another trail. – – “This Fussy Fatality” (from “Balancing Act: A Book of Poems by Ten Maine Women,” 1975) This fussy fatality I have found must belong to some god-like dog-day dreamer who, falling under the frequency of the full moon, forgets us, blinded by forgeries of the past, his eyes two telescopes of time turned inward. Pink and scarlet of dusk’s purgatorial keeps us in-and-out, flame-bent for purposes priceless and unfathomed. We return from forms of perfect mind to under zero, acknowledging the conditions of the day, harboring in undergarments our wares preserved with secret sacrifice. Logic makes checker squares on all that’s touched feigning bravado from every face I see; yet from the crevice of all eyes come these spiralling scarlet circles, mad-apple crimson. – “So What” (from Island Journal, 2021) You are Miles Davis disinterred, a Hamlet of Hypothermia, Part Faberge cloud, One piece of sky, a little amputation of eagle Hiding strong wide wings, wild offspring of Canada, queen of camouflage, perched like a coyote waiting for dark. Cynical archangel, Singing soundless hymns to an ancient heart, what memories, fears, loves and retributions do you inspire? Something too long absent, someone saying “I have always known you And know you still,” eyes promising never to leave you. Your talons clutch a branch that is my former soul. I say, I am Kind of Blue like that sea of yours. You smile As if you have just Devoured a crow somewhere In Labrador. So What 150-149
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