The Best Stuff I Read This Week

“The most important thing we learn at school is the fact that the most important things can’t be learned at school.”

— Haruki Murakami / What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

“Someone forgot to whisper your death to the bees
And so all the bees have left
And the fruit trees have died.”

— Ansel Elkins / “Someone Forgot to Whisper Your Death to the Bees”

“You’re stepping on your father, my mother said,
and indeed I was standing exactly in the center
of a bed of grass, mown so neatly it could have been
my father’s grave, although there was no stone saying so.”

— Louise Glück / “Aborigonal Landscape”

“This raises the inevitable question: What’s your policy
on fog? When it gets in bed with you, who’s on top?
Dances with you, who leads?”

— Bob Hicok / “Elements”

“If you touch it between the legs,
the splendid body will quicken
like bubbles in a just-on teakettle.”

— Rebecca Lindenberg / “The Splendid Body”

“… AS YOU STAND THERE AND GRILL HALAL

NOT JUST A REFUGEE WITH A BIG BEARD AND TRACKSUIT

NOW A DRAGONFLY LANDS ON YOUR ARM”

— Yahya Hassan / “Ramadan”

“Wonder is where it starts, and though wonder is also where it ends, this is no futile path.”

— Herman Hesse / Butterflies: Reflections, Tales, and Verse

What I’m Listening To:

“He grew up in a trailer, by the time he was nine
Rolled off to join the circus, telling fortunes on the side
Hail, hail, the Eyeball Kid”

— Tom Waits / “Eyeball Kid”