My hands hurt from packing. Next Monday movers will take
another "small" load to the new house. This week they took eight
bookcases and boxed books which I've started to unpack at the new place.
A week from tomorrow will be the "big move." After
that we have a week to come back and clean, and take whatever else is left.
Sometimes I wish I was more like my friend Pat who recently
sold almost everything she owns before she moves to Florida. Or like my friend
Karen whose immaculate, uncluttered house makes me feel calm.
Today, packing my oak filing cabinet I found a folder whose
label had fallen off. Inside: "Poems 1990," a neat, three-page, hand-written
list and the originals. I got a kick out of the first one which speaks to me almost
twenty-three years later.
NEW YEAR'S DAY
The first day of the year
the first day of the new decade
the first time I feel good
since I got back from Reno.
I dream about Liza
who looks like Divyananda
ruddy and spiritual like
a wild northern animal
genuinely heartened
by snow.
Today in Venice, with everything
the color of sand
including a dubious vagrant
in worn-out clothes
everything is ornamental
with the look of something
soon to be thrown away.
I want permanence.
I'd like to stir my tea
with this same spoon
fifty years from now.
I want something that lasts.
And since it isn't you
I'll find it in possessions
small enough to be carried
wherever I go.
I still have that spoon, and possessions too heavy to carry
alone. Plus a dog, two cats and a husband. The life I always wanted. I know of
course nothing is permanent. Which makes
me love them all the more.
