POEM A DAY 8: The Closet
By Almeda Glenn Miller
A few blankets, a lamp, four walls, some shelves.
I have squirreled away crackers. A bottle of water.
My head and toes touch each wall. I have a pillow.
I can hear you – all of you – outside this door.
This is the beginning and it is a very tight space.
Modest ideas bloom in my scribbly writes,
yellow sun of my lamp punctures holes in my theories
about breathing in dust and people in tiny worlds.
I have not read a book yet. I have only heard music.
Outside this door, countries are being redrawn,
children are hungry, rivers are dammed. I might need to pee soon.
This is the beginning and this is a very tight space.
The voices outside are suspicious of me:
I am writing eulogies for words that go missing,
inhabitants of small places disappearing in my breath.
Outside are weak, impoverished minds,
wishing, wanting, craving an easier way.
I am not your child. I am no great mind, nor am I a bohemian beauty
but a small poem, written in this closet,
reaches for something beyond fear.
This is the beginning and this is a very tight space.
For all the chroniclers that want to slip on a sliver of sunlight
beneath this door, I must warn you
that these words are all I have to offer,
their squish, bulge, and fury:
shimmery, butterfly ease.
If I must leave this place, then use these words
to raise your own poems in your own small place.
This is the beginning and this is a very tight space.
