thursday simple
tired, but otherwise content. so i thought i'd share a tired, contented
I Ask You
What scene would I rather be enveloped in
than this one,
an ordinary night at the kitchen table,
at ease in a box of floral wallpaper,
white cabinets full of glass,
the telephone silent,
a pen tilted back in my hand?
It gives me time to think
about the leaves gathering in the corners,
lichen greening the high grey rocks,
and the world sailing on beyond the dunes--
huge, oceangoing, history bubbling in its wake.
Outside of this room
there is nothing that I need,
not a job that would allow me to row to work,
or a coffee-colored Aston Martin
with cracked green leather seats.
No, it is all right here,
the clear ovals of a glass of water,
a small crate of oranges, a book on Stalin,
an odd snarling fish in a frame on the wall,
and these three candles,
each a different height, singing in perfect harmony.
So forgive me
if I lower my head and listen
to the short bass candle as he takes solo
while my heart
thrums under my shirt--
frog at the edge of a pond--
and my thoughts fly off to a province
composed of one enormous sky
and about a million empty branches.
from good 'ol billy collins. ST will be over in a bit. i'll sleep cradled. whoever thought i would be as lucky as that? so tonight, no complaints. just big, ordinary love, from me to you.
I Ask You
What scene would I rather be enveloped in
than this one,
an ordinary night at the kitchen table,
at ease in a box of floral wallpaper,
white cabinets full of glass,
the telephone silent,
a pen tilted back in my hand?
It gives me time to think
about the leaves gathering in the corners,
lichen greening the high grey rocks,
and the world sailing on beyond the dunes--
huge, oceangoing, history bubbling in its wake.
Outside of this room
there is nothing that I need,
not a job that would allow me to row to work,
or a coffee-colored Aston Martin
with cracked green leather seats.
No, it is all right here,
the clear ovals of a glass of water,
a small crate of oranges, a book on Stalin,
an odd snarling fish in a frame on the wall,
and these three candles,
each a different height, singing in perfect harmony.
So forgive me
if I lower my head and listen
to the short bass candle as he takes solo
while my heart
thrums under my shirt--
frog at the edge of a pond--
and my thoughts fly off to a province
composed of one enormous sky
and about a million empty branches.
from good 'ol billy collins. ST will be over in a bit. i'll sleep cradled. whoever thought i would be as lucky as that? so tonight, no complaints. just big, ordinary love, from me to you.