In this time of global uncertainty good poems can soften the heart and help us face another day with curiosity, wonder and hope. A good poem gives us another lens with which to view the world and helps bring what is often unseen into view. It can be the observation of a single ant making its way across a laptop computer or turtles in moonlight. Poetry opens us to feel our connection to one another and nature. It gives us the opportunity to recalibrate our perspective on our place in the world. Hirshfield says of her new book of poetry, Ledger, “It’s an attempt to find my way, navigating poem by poem over to some sense of the balance between the recognition of cataclysm and the appreciation of this still beautiful world with its abundance of treasures and gifts that I still open my eyes into every day . . . it’s a ledger of perhaps despair and praise.”
