In 1999, UNESCO proposed March 21 as World Poetry Day, recognizing the art form that can be found in every country in the world in one form or another. In doing so, UNESCO hoped to celebrate poetry and promote poetic expression. This year marks the 25th anniversary of this literary holiday, so today, I’d like to share my favorite poem with you. It’s by e. e. cummings, whose poetry has always fascinated me for his unique use of punctuation and beautiful imagery.
somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near
your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose
or if your wish be to close me,i and
my life will shut very beautifully,suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;
nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility:whose texture
compels me with the colour of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing
(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands