April 9, 2019

poem from an empty mind

Take what slips in—the leaf-blowers, a memory of a green velour dress, a blanket
made by a woman who wasn’t your grandmother—and walk through the threshold. 
Maybe this will take you to a wedding chuppah, a farm in rural Massachusetts, a road
with inconvenient potholes, a tray with lemonade glasses, a sign for fresh eggs, a field of
dandelions interrupted only by a pair of horses, and these will travel you elsewhere, 
to a town in southern Indiana that reunited you with an LP you hadn’t heard for years.
Not two feet away, there’s a painted seashell, an incense stick burnt down to its final inch, 
and below that a toy the dog has lost interest in, and more than a few clots of dust. 
While you are waiting for a greatness that may never appear, what about that photo 
on the mantel. The shutter clicked before you were ready, and aren’t you beautiful still?