It happens, sometimes. You’re reading a poem, and the finely crafted words trigger a memory so powerful that you’re back in that moment of time. In this case, a poem about a young boy presenting a “stolen” begonia (or one snatched from the restaurant’s plantings) took me back more than 40 years. We were eating with our toddler at a Mexican restaurant, when he decided to slip down from his booster seat, walk to a nearby table, and climb into an elderly man’s lap.
Mortified, we apologized, but the elderly man would have none of it. He was thrilled. He pointing to a younger couple seated at his table. “I keep telling them we’re waiting for our grandchildren.” He talked with our toddler for a few minutes, until our boy slid off his lap and came back to find a corn chip.
Many of the poems in Hard Listening by Alison Luterman prompt those kinds of memories.
To continue reading, please see my post today at Tweetspeak Poetry.
Some Tuesday Readings
The Case for Bringing Back Verse Plays – Amy Mantravadi at Mere Orthodoxy.
“What Are Years,” poem by Marianne Moore – D.S. Martin at Kingdom Poets.
“Stanzas for Music,” poem by Lord Byron – Joseph Bottum at Poems Ancient and Modern.
Heavenly Bodies – poem by Alison Luterman at Every Day Poems.
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