Photo by Jamie Morrison on Unsplash John Masefield was a British poet and the poet laureate of the U.K. from 1930-1967. He also wrote some novels of adventure, autobiographical works, and novels for children. As a young man, he was apprenticed on a sailing ship and one of his best-known poems brings that to mind. I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky, And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by, And the wheels kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking, And a grey mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking. I must…

Photo by John Bakator on Unsplash Jane Hirshfield is an American poet, essayist, and translator. Poet Kay Ryan described her as “that rare thing in contemporary American life, a true person of letters–an eloquent and exacting poet, first, but in addition the author of enduring essays and influential translations and anthologies.” There are names for what binds us: strong forces, weak forces. Look around, you can see them: the skin that forms in a half-empty cup, nails rusting into the places they join, joints dovetailed on their own weight. The way things stay so solidly wherever they’ve been set down– and gravity, scientists say, is weak. And see how the flesh grows back…