Among Angels…

Among Angels, poems by Nancy Willard & Jane Yolen

“Every visible thing in this world is put under charge of an angel.”
— St. Augustine

Prayer

Angel of lost spectacles
and hen’s teeth,

Angel of snow’s breath
and the insomnia

Of cats, angel
of snapshots fading

to infinity,
don’t drop me —

shoeless,
wingless.

Defender of burrows,
carry me —

carry me
in your pocket of light.
               — Nancy Willard

Every visible Thing

Asparagus I can believe
in its first green thrust;
McIntosh apples, tart on the bough;
cardinals like a blot on winter’s clean page;
raging crows on cropped fields.
Inching caterpillars I can believe,
fuzzy footed on a leafy spine;
trout rising at dusk;
shielding watered light;
Willows weighted over with ice;
even the black snake winding
through the startled grass.
But what angel, totting eternities of
      poison ivy,
      snail darters,
      brussels sprouts,
could have time or will for exaltations?

— Jane Yolen