THANK GOD IT'S FRIDAY

 

THANK GOD IT’S FRIDAY

    Heavens’s waters in God’s imagination…

    Paul Simon, Seven Psalms

Light summer rain,

cushions wet on the deck

and I put on a jacket

thinking I can stay dry

under the canopy of trees--

but the notebook gets wet,

looking around, it’s dry

under Autumn Blaze

but now I’m too close

to the bird feeder

and I’ve forced

the finches back up high

in the twin Hornbeams.

Karen’s moved to her chair

in the living room, still sleeping.

Off the bicycle now,

writing resurrection poems

in common time, I’ve had

my hearing aids checked out

and cleaned at Costco

while picking up two watermelons

for Father’s Day. I’m one of the ones

for whom the nachos are being prepared,

doubling up, both Dad and Grandpa,

when I get home two granddaughters

sit at kitchen table drawing.

I’ve set a bag of lemons

and a bag of limes on the counter.

Before I start the sugar water

on the stove I glance at Katie’s work.

She’s using water color pencils

to paint yellow tulips

in front of her window sill.

She knows how to shade

and her free-hand window

is a piece of time. Tulip stems

disappear in the water-filled vase

and how she makes that movement

in water, I can’t know, yet it makes

the glass in her window shimmer.

My lime-lemonade is tart

for all of us. I’ve cut some cold

chicken to go with a sleeve

of saltines. Dheezus, Katie,

Grandma, me. We slake our thirst

on a small table on the deck.

That bicycle ride around the development,

that was early, but I can’t

for the life of me, tell you which day.

Jim Bodeen

9 June 2023