Poet Jane Hirshfield said "... the feeling I have about poem-writing (is) that it is always an exploration, of discovering something I didn't already know. Who I am shifts from moment to moment, year to year. What I can perceive does as well. A new poem peers into mystery, into whatever lies just beyond the edge of knowable ground."

I bring a different poem to the writing classes each week, not only to inspire but to introduce new poets to the group members.

Coffee With Milk by Natalie Goldberg

It is very deep to have a cup of tea 
Also coffee in a white cup 
with milk 
a hand to go around the cup 
and a mouth to open and take it in 
It is very deep and very good to have a heart 
Do not take the heart for granted 
it fills with blood and lets blood out
 
Good to have this chair to sit in 
with these feet on the floor 
while I drink this coffee 
in a white cup 
To have the air around us to be in 
To fill our lungs and empty them like weeping 
this roof to house us 
the sky to house the roof in endless blue 
To be in the Midwest 
with the Atlantic over there 
and the Pacific on our other side
 
It is good this cup of coffee 
the milk in it 
the cows who gave us this milk 
this 
simple as a long piece of grass 

~from Top of My Lungs (The Overlook Press, 2002)