Sunday, February 3, 2013

Al Zolynas: "The Zen of Housework"


I look over my own shoulder
down my arms
to where they disappear under water
into hands inside pink rubber gloves
moiling among dinner dishes.

My hands lift a wine glass,
holding it by the stem and under the bowl.
It breaks the surface
like a chalice
rising from a medieval lake.

Full of the grey wine
of domesticity, the glass floats
to the level of my eyes.
Behind it, through the window
above the sink, the sun, among
a ceremony of sparrows and bare branches,
is setting in Western America.

I can see thousands of droplets
of steam—each a tiny spectrum—rising
from my goblet of grey wine.
They sway, changing directions
constantly—like a school of playful fish,
or like the sheer curtain
on the window to another world.

Ah, grey sacrament of the mundane!



"The Zen of Housework" by Al Zolynas, from The New Physics. © Wesleyan University Press, 1979.

Photography credit: Unknown (originally color).


3 comments :

  1. i LOVE TO READ ROBERT FROST, EMILY DICKENSON AS EX.
    I USUALLY JUST ENJOY POETRY THAT RHYMES, AND ABOVE TWO HAD THE TALENT TO NOT RHYME SO MUCH AND YET PRODUCE WONDERFUL POETRY FOREVER...

    ReplyDelete
  2. IN A SENSE, LOOKING AT THE MUNDANE FROM RITUAL.
    I CAN SEE INTERESTING THINGS, ANOTHER WORLD, IN ONE
    CUBIC INCH OF OF SOIL AS WELL AS SPACE THROUGH TELESCOPE.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ah, exquisitely simple, direct and powerful

    ReplyDelete

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