I think today's poem was inspired by yesterday's blog about Richard Ford's "Existence Period."
Ordinary
I never thought I’d be so ordinary--
another acorn or a worker ant,
another paper thrown onto the driveway
with the same weak, pink rubber band.
Are you ordinary, too?
Without a medal or a Guinness record,
unable to juggle more
than two balls at a time?
I make good omelets.
My secret is the microwave.
I cast lures well using a spinning reel
but have never learned to fly fish.
(That's what high class fishermen do.)
I glory in the ordinary! And why not?
What pumps up most of us beyond our fellows
is just the stuffing of tires with excess air.
It is enough for me to sweep the porch,
answer my e-mails, sometimes get drunk.
(OK—-get drunk more than that.)
Thine as ever,
CE
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Selected Poems and Love Poems 1998-2008 ON SALE NOW!
C.E.
ReplyDeleteOrdinary is so natural, so relaxed, so without pretense.
Let me be ordinary like the birds and the flowers and do a few things well.
Let me share your omelet and offer you some ordinary gift of mine.
A beer? Honey Brown ok?
And let's not think about tires, full of compressed airs shooting pain…
wishing you a good day
Yes, ordinary is such a relief.
ReplyDeleteA beer's fine, though I more often drink wine. Yes, forget the tires, they always run over somebody.
Thanks.