About six years ago I was at a teacher conference and the presenter gave us this poem to read using the reading strategies we had learned. I was partnered with a guy that obviously didn't like poetry and probably didn't want to be there. Our discussion didn't go far, but I was struck by the poem. I returning home and revisiting this poem numerous times. I later learned Marie Howe lost her brother to AIDs . The poem made more sense. I love the fresh approach to living. I have always been drawn to poems that help us remember the ordinary things like Drano, spilled coffee, or buying a hairbrush.
WHAT THE
LIVING DO
by Marie Howe
Johnny, the kitchen sink has been clogged for days, some utensil
probably fell down there.
And the Drano won't work but smells dangerous, and the crusty
dishes have piled up
waiting for the plumber I still haven't called. This is the
everyday we spoke of.
It's winter again: the sky's a deep, headstrong blue, and the
sunlight pours through
the open living-room windows because the heat's on too high in
here and I can't turn it off.
For weeks now, driving, or dropping a bag of groceries in the
street, the bag breaking,
I've been thinking: This is what the living do. And yesterday,
hurrying along those
wobbly bricks in the Cambridge sidewalk, spilling my coffee down
my wrist and sleeve,
I thought it again, and again later, when buying a hairbrush: This
is it.
Parking. Slamming the car door shut in the cold. What you called that
yearning.
What you finally gave up. We want the spring to come and the
winter to pass. We want
whoever to call or not call, a letter, a kiss--we want more and
more and then more of it.
But there are moments, walking, when I catch a glimpse of myself
in the window glass,
say, the window of the corner video store, and I'm gripped by a
cherishing so deep
for my own blowing hair, chapped face, and unbuttoned coat that
I'm speechless:
I am living. I remember you.
