The Marigold Bowl (poem)
The Marigold Bowl
The marigold bowl
Iridescent with the polished soles of a river rat’s
escape motions
And carrying, in gaudy panoply of purple green
On orange, a sense of occasion
If the wise man, who must have been there, counseling
Soft-core deadened by the light of a tiny screen
Mind hungry for results, feed-station repetition
A new head-scratcher, a new eye-catcher
If he had not foreseen
That while things outlive their owners—so they do
Things proliferate on earth and every coveting heart
Can find this crime reduced to a misdemeanor
Right the grudge of childhood with a card
From his height he never saw the future—
America, the mass garage sale, the auction-house
Tool him to a spice rack on the shelf
Where one can find the sage
The process of suctioning away into a hole
A sea worm…and of such creatures, the numbers are untold
leaving in its wake bits of flotsam
That waft unmoored for one last second
A willing helper, always a willing helper
Having not the dreamed-of life’s rewards
Not analytical not proud
enough to risk an admonition
Worried beyond all possible calumniation
To seem excited, moved by a feeling
Wrong about anything
Undermining in protest—this feebly
not rebelling
So there, the bowl, it isn’t worth anything now
No use supposing you’ll get it
The Marigold Bowl
The Minister of Inaction
(2017, Stephanie Foster)