“What’s in your drawer? Let’s praise it (to its face) with odes and apostrophes. Hello, Day 8!”
The poetry prompt for day eight of Writing 201 is “drawers.”
The form is “ode.”
The device is “apostrophe.”
Closets and Drawers
Oh, closets and drawers,
many years you’ve accommodated
me
s p a t o u s l y ,
but for more than a decade
I’ve taxed you to your limits.
Spilling your contents into the floor below
and filling up under the eaves of our home.
Through
hospitalization,
home renovation,
mold remediation,
illness,
a business upheaval,
and more …
Through death,
of this one,
then that one,
then another,
over six family members exiting, at a near yearly rate,
and add to that a few friends gone.
Mementoes,
documents,
papers,
accumulation,
life’s left-behinds to process and file.
You hid away what I couldn’t bear,
and enveloped what I needed to store.
And when somewhere in mid-life,
life went awry
with burdens beyond my capability or control,
you absorbed and hid the
overflow,
inability,
the chaos,
confusion
and pain.
And when trying to give what I didn’t have,
indispensable to others,
lost to myself,
closets and drawers, you filled to the brim,
tucking anguish and turmoil in to dark corners,
unaware you can’t hold and absorb
every thing
for every body,
all for all ,
without
the bottom
dropping
out.
You can’t cram-pack in space already filled,
‘though guilt will say that you should.
And you’re not unkind or terribly deficient.
You can only hold so much, and no more.
Closets and drawers, now I pare down your contents
and you, forgiving, relieved, let go
hidden remnants,
memories,
trauma,
pain.
Making room for space in the heart,
clarity, and vision,
because,
really,
what do I want left
when I’m gone?
Words and pictures by Terry Boswell
Copyright © 2015 Terry Boswell
wow firstly that really was quite a poem and well worth the wait. You hit a nerve at the end as I have been thinking about getting ‘rid’ of things too, i tend to keep far too much, i am far too sentimental, but what is teh point?
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Thank you! Yes, it can be pretty amazing what we purposely hold on to. Add to that what accumulates when we are overwhelmed, exhausted, or busy with other things and it can amount to an enormous quantity of stuff!
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yes i sometimes find knowing there is so much in there exhausting in itself lol x
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Very true!
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wow…
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I’m thinking that’s a good wow, so I’ll say thank you! 🙂
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I’m WOW’ing, too. The first part could be the poem of my life. I haven’t arrived at the second part yet, can’t get myself to let go and get rid…
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Thank you!
I think the letting go is hard, but absolutely essential to our wellbeing. 🙂
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