I found this poem in a lovely collection I got from the library called Sweeping Beauty: contemporary women poets do housework
Down on My Knees Ginger Andrews
cleaning out my refrigerator and thinking about writing a religious poem that somehow combines feeling sorry for myself with ordinary praise, when my nephew stumbles in for coffee to wash down what looks like a hangover and get rid of what he calls hot dog water breath. I wasn't going to bake the cake
now cooling on the counter, but I found a dozen eggs tipped sideways in their carton behind a leftover Thanksgiving Jell-O dish. There's something therapeutic about baking a devil's food cake, whipping up that buttercream frosting, knowing your sisters will drop by and say Lord yes they'd just love a little piece.
Everybody suffers, wants to run away, is broke after Christmas, stayed up too late to make it to church Sunday morning. Everybody should
drink coffee with their nephews, eat chocolate cake with their sisters, be thankful and happy enough under a warm and unexpected January sun.
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Date: 2012-07-22 12:49 pm (UTC)Down on My Knees
Ginger Andrews
cleaning out my refrigerator
and thinking about writing a religious poem
that somehow combines feeling sorry for myself
with ordinary praise, when my nephew stumbles in for coffee
to wash down what looks like a hangover
and get rid of what he calls hot dog water breath.
I wasn't going to bake the cake
now cooling on the counter, but I found a dozen eggs tipped
sideways in their carton behind a leftover Thanksgiving Jell-O dish.
There's something therapeutic about baking a devil's food cake,
whipping up that buttercream frosting,
knowing your sisters will drop by and say Lord yes
they'd just love a little piece.
Everybody suffers, wants to run away,
is broke after Christmas, stayed up too late
to make it to church Sunday morning. Everybody should
drink coffee with their nephews,
eat chocolate cake with their sisters, be thankful
and happy enough under a warm and unexpected January sun.