Collection

Toasts and Celebrations

Illustration by James Heimer.

Poems For Giving Toasts

- Found Letter
  Joshua Weiner
A quiet mind, a strong body, short hours
In the office; close friends who speak the truth;
Good food, cooked simply; a memory that’s rich
- A Toast for Men Yun-Ch’ing
  Du Fu
We had better empty the wine-cups.
To-morrow, at bright dawn, the world’s business will entangle us.
- Jet
  Tony Hoagland
and it is good, a way of letting life
out of the box, uncapping the bottle
to let the effervescence gush
through the narrow, usually constricted neck.
- Song
  Muriel Rukeyser
To celebrate the waking, wake.
Burn in the daylong light;
- My Triumph
  John Greenleaf Whittier
I feel the earth move sunward,
I join the great march onward
- Cheer
  Stanley Plumly
Be of good-cheer,

my father says, lifting his glass to greet
a morning in which he's awake to be
with the birds: or up all night in the sleep
of the world, alive again, singing.

Poems Of Praise And Celebration

- Praise Song for the Day
  Elizabeth Alexander
Praise song for every hand-lettered sign,
the figuring-it-out at kitchen tables.
- Lucille Clifton: “won't you celebrate with me”
  Robin Ekiss
won’t you celebrate with me
what i have shaped into
a kind of life? i had no model.
- Things to Do in New York (City)
  Ted Berrigan
celebrate your own
& everyone else’s birth:
- Lift Every Voice and Sing
  James Weldon Johnson
Let our rejoicing rise
High as the listening skies,

Odes To The Little Things

- In Praise of My Bed
  Meredith Holmes
I close my eyes, hear myself
moan, so grateful to be held this way.
- Hymn to the Comb-Over
  Wesley McNair
                                                   Let us praise them
in all of their varieties, some skinny
as the bands of headphones, some rising
- The Blessing of the Old Woman, the Tulip, and the Dog
  Alicia Ostriker
to live and work
so hard
God’s love
washes right through you
- More Than Enough
  Marge Piercy
Season of
joy for the bee. The green will never
again be so green,
- Ode to a Large Tuna in the Market
  Pablo Neruda
yours
was the only shape left
with purpose or direction
- Green Tea
  Dale Ritterbusch
toes pointing, a smile steeped
in ceremony, a celebration,

Seize The Day

- Center
  Josephine Miles
Where we can ponder, celebrate, and reshape
Not only what we are, where we are from,
But what in the risk and moment of our day
We may become.
- Immortal Sails
  Alfred Noyes
Now, in a breath, before we, too, grow old,
We'll mount and sing and spread immortal sails.
- Odes
  Fernando Pessoa
In each thing, be all. Give all you are
In the least you ever do.
- The House of Life: 71. The Choice, I
  Dante Gabriel Rossetti
Eat thou and drink; to-morrow thou shalt die.