Poem Number 23236

Putting your tools in order

This is a rewrite # 14103 1999
Teak boards
carefully cut ,mitered, cobwebbed
stacked,
spindles
banded in perfect bundles
chisel ,chisel ,chisel, nail set ,rasp.
A glance out the window to were an orchard was,
to a greenhouse
that is frame and broken glass,
to that morning when the mother
quail marched her chicks in precise military order
past the ironwoods by the grape arbor.
There is a pomegranate left. The fruit is gone but a solitary
hollow leathered rind remains bobbing and shifting in the wind.
There is an emptiness in that, a sadness
akin to the thought of death and I see
it of course but I won’t let my mind go there
rather, I rap my arm around an apricot tree
( once not 30 yards from here) and hand down
pail after pail to you who in turn
gives them to mom
where they end up under a fine layer of
paraffin on her pantry shelves
Drill bit, drill bit, drill bit, glass cutter, router bit baring,
spring from something, echoes of old dusty words that settle by the cot you put out
toward the end when you took an afternoon nap.
You would say come on kid all that is Just stuff
and it really doesn’t matter. None the less I’m still trying
to put your tools in order

-------
For me this is about a loss--possibly a father--and the very mundane happenings enhance that feeling--very poignant. JFC