The Google, She Makes Such Strange Bedfellows

I am trying to write a poem about
my childhood manger saved from
so much I long to say something
about the yearning it wakes, about
ancient tissue soft with years given to
protecting the dog with a busted foot,
wise man stamped 29 cents on his base,
Baby Jesus with his crackled paint,
Joseph’s broken nose

There’s something I wanted to say
about this longing for all the broken past
But in that trick words love to play
the word manger looks wrong
Googled, I land on a food blog
from the French countryside called
Manger, and though I’m sure these soft
focus gorgeously photographed people
do eat, they appear to mostly romp
through vineyards carrying bowls of
apples and wearing shiny Wellies.

I can’t picture Mary or Baby Jesus
in Wellies but in the way of the Internet
one longing is replaced by another
longing and I dream of dinner
in France as I pack away
the older battered longings
of a different manger