That Thing With Feathers

 

Maybe because the snow’s melted enough to reveal tulip and daffodil shoots and in sunnier yards, actual crocuses. Maybe because of soft, vernal light. Maybe because Easter—as confusing and complicated as it is for me—is Sunday. Certainly being on the other side of a several, recent, challenging events helps. But I’m hopeful.

Why? Because of two articles in The Boston Globe, one on the statewide pushback re drug-sniffing dogs in Department of Correction visiting centers, the other, a scathing report re Massachusetts’ regressive get-tough-on-crime policies . Could these articles mark the moment when the proverbial paradigm shifts? Is something different emerging? I choose to believe so.

This morning, the online writing group I am blessed to discover I’ve “joined” has been oohing about the wonderful poem that follows (sorry about the mishmash fonts):

WHAT THE LIVING DO 
by Marie Howe
Johnny, the kitchen sink has been clogged for days, some utensil probably fell down there.
And the Drano won’t work but smells dangerous, and the crusty dishes have piled up

waiting for the plumber I still haven’t called. This is the everyday we spoke of.
It’s winter again: the sky’s a deep, headstrong blue, and the sunlight pours through

the open living-room windows because the heat’s on too high in here and I can’t turn it off.
For weeks now, driving, or dropping a bag of groceries in the street, the bag breaking,

I’ve been thinking: This is what the living do. And yesterday, hurrying along those
wobbly bricks in the Cambridge sidewalk, spilling my coffee down my wrist and sleeve,

I thought it again, and again later, when buying a hairbrush: This is it.
Parking. Slamming the car door shut in the cold. What you called that yearning.

What you finally gave up. We want the spring to come and the winter to pass. We want
whoever to call or not call, a letter, a kiss–we want more and more and then more of it.

But there are moments, walking, when I catch a glimpse of myself in the window glass,
say, the window of the corner video store, and I’m gripped by a cherishing so deep

for my own blowing hair, chapped face, and unbuttoned coat that I’m speechless:
I am living. I remember you.

I live. I hope.