27 January 2008

I have a confession.

I'm going to steal a poem you didn't write yet.


You told me about it last week, while we were walking down from the Knob. We were coming down those narrow and sandy steps that lead back towards the shore, when you grabbed my elbow.


A moment before I'd been standing up top, looking out across the water, messing with a camera. You'd been talking to a couple about their dogs, a brown bull dog and a dalmatian in disguise--she was black and only had spots on her chest.


'I could write a poem about that,' you said, grabbing me by the elbow just before we were out of earshot, 'his and her dogs.'


You know, Grandma, the secret I can't seem to learn: that poems aren't hard to write.


Around you, nothing is safe.
Not your evening dish of rocky road;
Not the red bench by Quissett Harbor;
Not the table we found behind Pie in the Sky, where we sat drinking chai in the late afternoon facing the Steamship Authority, the ferry launch, and the sun;
Not even those unsuspecting strangers who told you about their dogs.


You know, Grandma, the secret I seem to forget: that nothing is ordinary and when we write we can keep whatever we take.

6 comments:

janie said...

i love it, hannah. it takes me there with you.

beijos said...

yess a table behind pie in the sky??

Anonymous said...

:) love it.

and that first sentence came to my mind a lot during this day...

myinkwell said...

nice hannah. really.

Hope said...

So great Hannah.

Ruth C said...

yes. i do like it. and i see exactly what you mean :)
<3