wishes for sons by Lucille Clifton i wish them cramps. i wish them a strange town and the last tampon. I wish them no 7-11. i wish them one week early and wearing a white skirt. i wish them one week late. later i wish them hot flashes and clots like you wouldn't believe. let the flashes come when they meet someone special. let the clots come when they want to. let them think they have accepted arrogance in the universe, then bring them to gynecologists not unlike themselves.

they ask me to remember but they want me to remember their memories and I keep on remembering mine

Every pair of eyes facing you has probably experienced something you could not endure.

Even when the universe made it quite clear to me that I was mistaken in my certainties ... I did not break. The shattering of my sureties did not shatter me.

Poems come out of wonder, not out of knowing.

Poetry is a matter of life, not just a matter of language.

We cannot create what we can't imagine.