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The Moon

The Lanyard - Billy Collins

The other day I was ricocheting slowly
off the blue walls of this room,
moving as if underwater from typewriter to piano,
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
when I found myself in the L section of the dictionary
where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.

No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one into the past more suddenly—
a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp
by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid long thin plastic strips
into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.

I had never seen anyone use a lanyard
or wear one, if that’s what you did with them,
but that did not keep me from crossing
strand over strand again and again
until I had made a boxy
red and white lanyard for my mother.

She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sick room,
lifted spoons of medicine to my lips,
laid cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light

and taught me to walk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,
which I made with a little help from a counselor.

Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth,
and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,
and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now,
is a smaller gift—not the worn truth

that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took
the two-tone lanyard from my hand,
I was as sure as a boy could be
that this useless, worthless thing I wove
out of boredom would be enough to make us e

Happiness

So early it’s still almost dark out.

I’m near the window with coffee,

And the usual early morning stuff

That passes for thought.

When I see the boy and his friend

Walking up the road

To deliver the newspaper.

They wear caps and sweaters,

And one boy has a bag over his shoulder.

They are so happy

They aren’t saying anything, these boys.

I think if they could, they would take

Each to other’s arm.

It’s early in the morning,

And they are doing this thing together.

They come on, slowly.

The sky is taking on light,

Though the moon still hangs pale over the water.

Such beauty that for a minute

Death ambition, even love,

Doesn’t enter into this.

Happiness. It comes on

Unexpectedly. And goes beyond, really,

Any early morning talk about it.

Raymond Carver

Trout

Lanyard