Years ago my college roommate Sarita gave me a book of poems by Alice Walker called Horses Make a Landscape Look More Beautiful. A favorite from that collection is a poem called HOW POEMS ARE MADE/A DISCREDITED VIEW. I was reminded of the poem yesterday when someone talked about letting a lover go. I feel inspired to share it, but I’m not sure about the rules about posting entire poems. I’ll post the first two stanzas, and let you follow a link to the rest of it.

HOW POEMS ARE MADE: A DISCREDITED VIEW
by Alice Walker

Letting go
in order to hold on
I gradually understand
how poems are made.

There is a place the fear must go.
There is a place the choice must go.
There is a place the loss must go.
The leftover love.
The love that spills out
of the too full cup
and runs and hides
its too full self
in shame.

Click here to read the whole poem.