Temporary Poem Of My Time by Yehuda Amichai

Hebrew writing and Arabic writing go from east to west,
Latin writing, from west to east.
Languages are like cats:
You must not stroke their hair the wrong way.
The clouds come from the sea, the hot wind from the desert,
The trees bend in the wind,
And stones fly from all four winds,
Into all four winds. They throw stones,
Throw this land, one at the other,
But the land always falls back to the land.
They throw the land, want to get rid of it.
Its stones, its soil, but you can’t get rid of it.
They throw stones, throw stones at me
In 1936, 1938, 1948, 1988,
Semites throw at Semites and anti-Semites at anti-Semites,
Evil men throw and just men throw,
Sinners throw and tempters throw,
Geologists throw and theologists throw,
Archaelogists throw and archhooligans throw,
Kidneys throw stones and gall bladders throw,
Head stones and forehead stones and the heart of a stone,
Stones shaped like a screaming mouth
And stones fitting your eyes
Like a pair of glasses,
The past throws stones at the future,
And all of them fall on the present.
Weeping stones and laughing gravel stones,
Even God in the Bible threw stones,
Even the Urim and Tumim were thrown
And got stuck in the beastplate of justice,
And Herod threw stones and what came out was a Temple.

Oh, the poem of stone sadness
Oh, the poem thrown on the stones
Oh, the poem of thrown stones.
Is there in this land
A stone that was never thrown
And never built and never overturned
And never uncovered and never discovered
And never screamed from a wall and never discarded by the builders
And never closed on top of a grave and never lay under lovers
And never turned into a cornerstone?

Please do not throw any more stones,
You are moving the land,
The holy, whole, open land,
You are moving it to the sea
And the sea doesn’t want it
The sea says, not in me.

Please throw little stones,
Throw snail fossils, throw gravel,
Justice or injustice from the quarries of Migdal Tsedek,
Throw soft stones, throw sweet clods,
Throw limestone, throw clay,
Throw sand of the seashore,
Throw dust of the desert, throw rust,
Throw soil, throw wind,
Throw air, throw nothing
Until your hands are weary
And the war is weary
And even peace will be weary and will be.

Peace Walk by William E. Stafford

We wondered what our walk should mean,
taking that un-march quietly;
the sun stared at our signs— “Thou shalt not kill.”

Men by a tavern said, “Those foreigners . . .”
to a woman with a fur, who turned away—
like an elevator going down, their look at us.

Along a curb, their signs lined across,
a picket line stopped and stared
the whole width of the street, at ours: “Unfair.”

Above our heads the sound truck blared—
by the park, under the autumn trees—
it said that love could fill the atmosphere:

Occur, slow the other fallout, unseen,
on islands everywhere—fallout, falling
unheard. We held our poster up to shade our eyes.

At the end we just walked away;
no one was there to tell us where to leave the signs.

To Esclarmondo by Grace Fallow Norton

If thou couldst walk alone with thought,
Alone within the day,
Between thy soul and Heaven naught
To shadow thy white way :

If thou couldst walk alone with dreams,
Without the cloud of me —
My sudden storms, my fitful gleams,
My poor reality:

If thou couldst walk alone with light —
Would then thine eyes see true?
And were there thus a higher height
For thee, a rapture new ?

Cloud, I would melt in willing tears,
Storm, I would gladly go
Forth from thy peace through all the years,
If thou wert safer so.

But ah, who walks with thought alone?
Who is there knows but light ?
And who with naught but dreams has grown
To that desired height ?

Requests by Digby Mackworth Dolben

I asked for Peace—
 My sins arose,
 And bound me close,
I could not find release.

I asked for Truth—
 My doubts came in,
 And with their din
They wearied all my youth.

I asked for Love—
 My lovers failed,
 And griefs assailed
Around, beneath, above.

I asked for Thee—
 And Thou didst come
 To take me home
Within Thy Heart to be.

The Old Woman by Joseph Campbell

As a white candle
In a holy place,
So is the beauty
Of an aged face.

As the spent radience
Of the winter sun,
So is a woman
With her travail done.

Her brood gone from her,
And her thoughts as still
As the waters
Under a ruined mill.

Explosion Affected Reflection by Helle van Aardeberg

This Poem won the ‘Poetry for Peace’ contest held by the UN.

Blasted into a wasteland,

behind an old torn photo

Father silently weeps

for what were once his people

their voices and love forsaken

while Mother has grown old torn

in recollection with grief

her children’s young kisses

still innocent upon her cheek;

memorizing,

unborn babies hear exploding bombs as yet she stares,

despondent,

out the broken window,

in remembrance for peace.