Poems from Alice Walker

Poems
Diane Sawyer told Oprah she always carries a poem book in her bag. Her favorite author is Alice Walker
Here is a sampling of some of her work:

Before you knew you owned it

Expect nothing. Live frugally
On surprise.
become a stranger
To need of pity
Or, if compassion be freely
Given out
Take only enough
Stop short of urge to plead
Then purge away the need.

Wish for nothing larger
Than your own small heart
Or greater than a star;
Tame wild disappointment
With caress unmoved and cold
Make of it a parka
For your soul.

Discover the reason why
So tiny human midget
Exists at all
So scared unwise
But expect nothing. Live frugally
On surprise.

When Golda Meir was in
Africa

When Golda Meir
Was in Africa
She shook out her hair
And combed it
Everywhere she went.

According to her autobiography
Africans loved this.

In Russia, Minneapolis, London, Washington, D.C.,
Germany, Palestine, Tel Aviv and
Jerusalem
She never combed at all.
There was no point. In those
Places people said, “She looks like
Any other aging grandmother. She looks
Like a troll. Let’s sell her cookery
And guns.”

“Kreplach your cookery,” said Golda.

Only in Africa could she finally
Settle down and comb her hair.
The children crept up and stroked it,
And she felt beautiful.

Such wonderful people, Africans
Childish, arrogant, self-indulgent, pompous,
Cowardly and treacherous—a great disappointment
To Israel, of course, and really rather
Ridiculous in international affairs
But, withal, opined Golda, a people of charm
And good taste.

EACH ONE, PULL ONE

(Thinking of Lorraine Hansberry)

We must say it all, and as clearly
Trying to bury us.
As we can. For, even before we are dead,

Were we black? Were we women? Were we gay?
Were we the wrong shade of black? Were we yellow?
Did we, God forbid, love the wrong person, country?
Or politics? Were we Agnes Smedley or John Brown?

But, most of all, did we write exactly what we saw,
As clearly as we could? Were we unsophisticated
Enough to cry and scream?

Well, then, they will fill our eyes,
Our ears, our noses and our mouths
With the mud
Of oblivion. They will chew up
Our fingers in the night. They will pick
Their teeth with our pens. They will sabotage
Both our children
And our art.

Because when we show what we see,
They will discern the inevitable:
We do not worship them.

We do not worship them.
We do not worship what they have made.
We do not trust them.

We do not believe what they say.
We do not love their efficiency.
Or their power plants.
We do not love their factories.
Or their smog.
We do not love their television programs.
Or their radioactive leaks.
We find their papers boring.
We do not worship their cars.
We do not worship their blondes.
We do not think much
Of their Renaissance
We are indifferent to England.
We have grave doubts about their brains.

In short, we who write, paint, sculpt, dance
Or sing
Share the intelligence and thus the fate
Of all our people
In this land.
We are not different from them,
Neither above nor below,
Outside nor inside.
We are the same.
And we do not worship them.

We do not worship them.