When You Find a Grocery List in Your Poetry Journal

When people ask me what I do, I tell them I'm a writer. The next question is often about what I write. For many years - knee high in the thick of mothering four children - I chuckled and said, "A lot of grocery and shopping lists."

So last week, when I found a grocery list in the middle of my poetry journal, I smiled. How perfect. Some of my older journals are interspersed with my children's drawings. In others you'll find remnants of hangman games that I played with my son while we waited for our food to come at our restaurant dates.

The grocery list - and the airplanes drawings and hangman games - prompted this poem.

When You Find a Grocery List in Your Poetry Journal

Sandwiched between your poems
you find the daily bread of your mothering -
notes from your son's college night and
a scribbled grocery list. At first they look
out of place. But when you move to tear
them out, you pause: how fitting that they
live here. Like your notebook your life is
not pristine. Everything bleeds into
everything else. Instead of tearing out
the pages you wish to add more -
the laundry waiting to be folded, the dirty
dishes in the sink, the to do list that's never
done; the parts of yourself you think you
need to erase from the pages of your life.
Did I feed the dog? Did I pay the bill?
Did I pause and wonder about the fig tree
dropping her ripe fruit over the fence? Did
I open my heart today to the laundry and
to the world?

If you appreciate receiving the poems of O Nobly Born, I'd love your financial support. You can make a $10 donation here by credit card or a donation of any amount through paypal at paypal@growinghumankindness.com. I cherish every donation, as they support my work and enable me to offer these poems freely to all.

With a grateful heart, Karly