Photo by Hannah Busing on Unsplash

Introduction by Ted Kooser: It seems that love poems have a better chance of being passed around from person to person than other poems, and here’s one by Richard M. Berlin, who lives in the Berkshire hills of western Massachusetts, that we’d like to pass along to you.

Einstein’s happiest moment

occurred when he realized

a falling man falling

beside a falling apple

could also be described

as an apple and a man at rest

while the world falls around them.

And my happiest moment

occurred when I realized

you were falling for me,

right down to the core, and the rest,

relatively speaking, has flown past

faster than the speed of light.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2011 by Richard M. Berlin from his most recent book of poems, Secret Wounds, BkMk Press, 2011. Poem reprinted by permission of Richard M. Berlin and the publisher. Introduction copyright 2012 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.

Photo courtesy dimitri_c

It pains an old booklover like me to think of somebody burning a book, but if you’ve gotten one for a quarter and it’s falling apart, well, maybe it’s OK as long as you might be planning to pick up a better copy. Here Ron Koertge, who lives in Pasadena, has some fun with the ashes of love poems. [Introduction by Ted Kooser.]

Burning the Book

The anthology of love poems I bought

for a quarter is brittle, anyway, and comes

apart when I read it.

One at a time, I throw pages on the fire

and watch smoke make its way up

and out.

I’m almost to the index when I hear

a murmuring in the street. My neighbors

are watching it snow.

I put on my blue jacket and join them.

The children stand with their mouths

open.

I can see nouns—longing, rapture, bliss—

land on every tongue, then disappear.