narrative poetry – Sarah Stoltzfus Allen

Stepping into the Ring, Having Just Been Kicked Out of the Boys’ Competition, PYTHAGORAS OF SAMOOOOOOOOOOOS!!!!!!!!

There once was a Lickety Split
who knew how to take a hard hit.
He’d wiggle and shake,
refused all the brakes,
and got out of there, fast with his wit.

“His wit,” you ask and you scratch,
“is no good in a fisticuffs match.”
But he made them all dizzy
when he whirled in a tizzy
while spewing mathematical facts.

The aggressors were no good at sums,
they should have been sucking their thumbs.
They thought he’d gone crazy,
but always got hazy,
and with one calculated punch, they succumbed.

***

This is based on a true-ish story. Historians disagree about the identity of Pythagoras of Samos, who won men’s boxing at the olympics (after he was kicked out of the boys competition because he was too effeminate). Some believe that this Pythagoras was the famed mathematician. Some believe that it’s a completely different dude. I like to think it was the mathematician.

Multivitamin

I’m forty years old
and my multivitamin is the best part
of my entire day.

Well, that’s probably not exactly true.
I also really like the first sip of coffee,
the way I can see a cardinal at my bird feeder
as soon as I open my eyes in the morning,
and the way the sun filters through the curtains
in the evenings and makes my whole bed a golden nest.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the smiles
I still get from my boys when I get home,
the jangling of ice in my favorite water cup,
and text messages from friends.

But that multivitamin?
It tastes like childhood:
sour fruit snack gummies and books
read by flashlight well past bedtime,
mouth watering stares into bins of rainbow
colored candies that were scooped into brown
paper bags that I clutched in my little girl hands
and savored over every day of our summer vacation,
and standing in the candy aisle with my granny
while she picked out her favorite sugar free gum
and then let me pick out my favorite
sugar bursting chewy sweet.

I didn’t realize when I turned forty that I would try
to relive all those favorite childhood things every morning,
but here we are:
giving up most of the super sugary treats in favor
of more grownup needs and taste buds,
trying to take care of an aging body
that now has a laundry list of medical diagnoses,
and whining about my liney eyes.

But that multivitamin,
suggested by doctors to help my body do
what it is supposed to do?
Well, it may not keep me young, but it’s an honest
choice to keep going and to make sure
the girl I used to be sees all our
dreams come true.

Two for Mirth

A pair of crows are arguing on the fence
across the street from my office window.
It’s not a big argument, full of caws
and flashing beaks. No, it’s a comfortable
quarrel of picking feathers and well-reasoned
fluffing feathers and hopping away a few inches.

One has flown and I am sad for the remaining,
sure that sorrow has come to stay.
She flutters away for a moment or two,
but she always comes back to the same perch.
Her eyes search the sky and I know if I look later,
evidence of her nervous talons will be seen on the wood.

I’ve finished my breakfast and I’m starting the second
cup of tea, consumed with numbers and calculations.
Human issues of taxes and income and lost revenues
take up the majority of my mind, but occasionally my eyes
flit to the waiting crow. She’s still there on her fence rail.
I assume she’s anxious for his return, but maybe she knows

right around 10 o’clock a sweeping black will cross my sight.
I watch him settle beside her, a peanut in his beak
and a shiny ribbon tangled about his foot.
The peanut is passed between them, the ribbon swaying pretty.
A comfortable quarrel continues, but the hopping away is traded
for gentle nudges, head touches, while spring laughs around them.

Sweeping Superstitions

Don’t let nobody sweep under your feet, she said
as I pulled my feet up onto the couch,
placing my little girl chin on my knees.
“Why can’t you sweep under my feet?” I asked.
I want to see you married someday, my girl.

From her brown corduroy couch, I watched
as she swept her floors, a wooden handled
straw broom for the kitchen and dining room,
and a rainbow vacuum for the carpets.
She sang and swept. Swept and sang.

I was there the day the salesman sold
her the promise of clean carpets
and an easier time keeping her house in order.
It seemed to me she worked just as hard
with the rainbow as she had before.

The day I was moving out of my university dorm
and into my first apartment, she visited me.
She held out a brand-new broom and dustpan.
Don’t take your old broom into your new house, she said.
Let the old dirt stay where it is.

When everyone had cleared out of my new place,
I swept and sang. Sang and swept.
I surveyed my kitchen floors just like she had
and decided it was probably for the best
that I’d left the old dirt in my old life.

Jim

What you do to pay the bills is not who you are, he said,
tipping his beer towards me and then taking
a long swig while I watched his eyes sparkle.

We ate our cake, chatting about the newly married
couple making spirals around the room, stopping
for a kiss whenever anyone clinked their glass.

Who you are is what you do in your spare time.
He scraped the icing from his plate, smiled
at his wife, and then leaned back in his chair.

So, my dear, who are you?

I didn’t know Jim well. He was the husband of one of my very good friends, Sarah Ryder. He recently passed, and I thought it fitting to share with the world the spectacular advice that he gave to me many years ago at a wedding reception. “What you do to pay the bills is not who you are. Who you are is what you do in your spare time.” Those simple sentences have stuck with me ever since. I repeat them to myself over and over on a regular basis. Jim was an absolute light and he will be missed.

Summer Jewels

She could often be found
admiring the fruits of her labor
in her fully stocked pantry –
mason jars of green beans, corn,
tomato juice, tomato sauce, various soups.
She adjusted their stacked-up lines,
shining jewels in summer colors
waiting to be enjoyed once the cold came in.

Six months after my granny died,
I watched my mother from her kitchen table,
She held the last of the green beans,
having rationed the last ten jars,
knowing that when they were gone
there would be no replacement beans
coming this summer.

Opening the jar, she let tears fall.
Silvery jewels of grief slipping silently
down her cheeks and onto her apron.
She held them up to her nose,
and then quickly dumped them
into the pot on the stove.

The last of the summer jewels
graced our Sunday lunch plates
for a final time.