In work boots and plaid and feed store cap,
he looked like an elderly farmer
next to me in the stationery aisle,
one calm spot in the supermarket rush hour.
He told me he probably owned a thousand pens.
Whenever a new one caught his eye he had to have it.
I smiled and backed away, tired, late getting home,
shopping list lost as usual.
Sometimes I have to be stern with myself:
There wasn’t enough time to stumble
into rambling conversations with eccentric strangers.
But he said he used them all,
nearly shouting as I reached the end of the aisle,
because there was so much to write and draw every day.
Hours later, I haven’t saved any time at all–
still wondering, wishing I could trade this back
for time to wheel my shopping cart closer
and ask him to tell me
what he’s drawing now.
Category Archives: Creativity
Efficiency
Dear Ted Kooser
I intended to read your poems
certain they were full of
Delights and shadows.
However—
Yesterday, my friend snatched your book from the table
Not, sadly, because she is a lover of forthright poetry
but because your book was the perfect shape
to hold the yarn she unspooled
in a determined attempt
to teach me to make a ribbon scarf.
Ted, my enthusiasm for the project was minimal at first
but now this odd-looking yarn full of webbed bits of glitter
holds you firmly closed
and the only way to get to the heart-or even the surface
of your words is to
knit
my
way
there.
The good news is
when I arrive
I’ll have a scarf to keep me warm.
And maybe this is how poetry should be taught from now on:
Anticipation will hone the senses
and we’ll have made something useful of our journey.
What we can bring to the poem is lovely now—
Time, woven and warmed by our own hands.
Puff Of Smoke Poems 