Finally, Then

 

After dinner is over, dishes clean,

their porcelain lips stacked in smiles

behind the cupboard door.

 

After your desk is organized,

emails sent, final draft finished,

your to-do list a flock of check marks,

migratory birds flapping

down the column and out

to the horizon of a light-suffused land

called Everything is Done.

 

Finally, you can do whatever it is

you say you’ve always wanted to do.

Or not said, because naming can sometimes

dilute a dream’s dark essence.

 

But there’s bank overdraft to fix,

unread library books to return,

another doctor’s appointment,

and these days when you accelerate,

your car makes a screaming noise

like a small trapped animal.

You can picture its curled body

and dark eyes, terrified your speed

will toss it onto the moving parts

of a machine made only to go.

Maybe, after you get it fixed,

clear up a few other things,

finally, then, you’ll have time.

Laura Grace Weldon

 

Originally published by Great Lakes Review.  Find more poetry in my collection, Tending.