First draft: What Else You Need To Know Today

May 16, 2021 22:15

This American Life is not usually my jam, but I caught the tail end of Episode 737 on my drive home from Percy Priest yesterday, and as Ira Glass's closing litany spun out, I thought, “Niiiice!” and “What a great writing prompt!” So here’s a riff . . .




Here’s What Else You Need To Know Today

The wirecutters you find first are the right wirecutters.

It helps, though, to put the best wirecutters in your future way.

Not every wire serves a stake or a wreath.

Show me a piano, and I’ll sing to you of dinner theater stubs.

Numbers can lie, but words fool around more.

Music can vault you into the clouds, but figured bass keeps my heart grounded.

Your skin is delicious not because it was baked by the sun, but because it tastes of the sun in Friday’s soup.

It’s not about cleaning your plate, but appreciating the preparation of it.

You are not betraying the ancestors when you outgrow a recipe.

Especially if it always felt like too-tight tights. Or the other things that have never quite fit you.

The camera does add ten pounds, but most people aren’t looking at you.

You-yes, you-are a part of this dance, even if your feet stay on the floor.

We will not survive this, but we have stories to tell.


This entry was originally posted at https://zirconium.dreamwidth.org/176046.html.

poems

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