Wednesday Poetry Break: “Ordinary” Edition

Here’s a poem for the first days of summer, which Garrison Keiller read on the Writer’s Almanac this morning. I know, technically it’s not summer yet, but there have been lightening bugs spotted in the backyard, and I have been mowing the lawn for weeks now, so that’s good enough for me!

The Ordinary

It’s summer, so
the pink gingham shorts,
the red mower, the neat rows
of clean smelling grass
unspooling behind
the sweeping blades.

A dragonfly, black body
big as a finger, will not leave
the mower alone,
loving the sparkle
of scarlet metal,
seeing in even a rusting paint
the shade of a flower.

But I wave him off,
conscious he is
wasting his time,
conscious I am
filling my time
with such small details,
distracting colors,

like pink checks,
like this, then that,
like a dragonfly wing
in the sun reflecting
the color of opals,
like all the hours
we leave behind,
so ordinary,
but not unloved.

– Kirsten Dierking

photo credit: Luc Viatour