So I was ironing pants at 12: 43 am. Wished I was in bed, but had had to clean a mountain of dishes and prepare homework for today. Ended up with a little over six hours of sleep. (yawn) No wonder this poem is nonsensical!
UNTHOUGHTS FROM ELSEWHERE
Ironing past midnight.
Dishwasher growling from kitchen.
Legs slightly shivery in sweatpants.
Iron hissing, clicking. Fingers
Mechanically matching cuffs,
Pressing pleats.
Slightly sleep-deprived, brain numbed by
Homework overload,
My mind has wandered Elsewhere.
Far away from this night and
The khaki slacks on the ironing board.
Far away in Elsewhere, my brain is filled with
Swirling bits of life:
Green banana motorcycles and
Hot cocoa slushies from
A dream last Tuesday.
A promise, a pomegranate and
A line from a song.
Faces from camp last summer, a
Forgotten conversation,
Autumn wind and a fancy monkey.
Welcome to the hodgepodge, this conglomeration
Snippets and miscellaneous scraps of life.
How many toes on a hippopotamus?
Is that an esophagus or a sarcophagus?
Where did I misplace my hairbrush?
What's the plural of metamorphosis?
And most importantly,
If my mouth were quadrupled
In size, would my head
Disappear when I yawned?
Entirely possible
In this other place called Elsewhere.
My mind sails on, untethered...
It's fun not to think.
This game could last forever
This unthinking of unthoughts
Lighter than cotton-candy-air...
Mosquitoes and marbles and words long ago
Borne on the cerebral trade winds,
Unthoughts harbored for a moment
And released, float away.
Brilliance or insanity, this
Unthinking of unthoughts.
Who cares?
2 comments:
Julia, I absolutely LOVE this! I confess, this is my favorite poem yet from your collection. But then, I am a bit "partialer" to nonsense than a lot of people.
You rock :)
Love, Cass
haha, I love it too. I keep wanting to go back and read it again!
It was rather freeing, somehow, to write a poem of sheer ridiculosity--with words that aren't real! This poem was definitely worth staying up an extra fifteen minutes.
I can't wait to read about your talking camels! Hmm, maybe all we need is more lighthearted nonsense in our lives. =)
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