Morning Prayer--a poem

The speaker in this morning's poem from Writer's Almanac is kind of a scold--maybe that's why I like him, or her. Once he or she identifies himself or herself, he seems more than ready to stand up and hold forth in manner of the prophet Jeremiah.

That tone of voice is in me too as I start the year with another gang of kids who are all, so noticeably, yet another year younger. I feel more and more, well, grandfatherly, more and more as if I ought to just shut the notes and deliver a sermon about what old men know and young kids sure as heck don't. This morning's poem makes me want to raise a pointer and preach. Listen.

Drugstore by Carl Dennis

Don't be ashamed that your parents
Didn't happen to meet at an art exhibit
Or at a protest against a foreign policy
Based on fear of negotiation,
But in an aisle of a discount drugstore,
Near the antihistamine section,
Seeking relief from the common cold.

See what I mean? He uses the command form, in the negative too. Don't do this, don't do that. Don't be thinking you somehow lack privilege or stature or romance, he says. Just don't, because you ought to be proud. . . Listen.

You ought to be proud that even there,
Amid coughs and sneezes,
They were able to peer beneath
The veil of pointless happenstance.

Same voice. You ought to be taken with the fact that your folks could climb above their silly serendipity and see that somehow the man or woman they'd somehow run into with the cough syrup was, potentially at least, some thing much bigger and better than sore throat relief.

Here is someone, each thought,
Able to laugh at the indignities
That flesh is heir to. Here
Is a person one might care about.
Not love at first sight, but the will
To be ready to endorse the feeling
Should it arise.

I really should run this poem off and show it to my students. Don't know if they'd get it, but it would be good for them. Don't be disregarding who you are or what you come from because the fact is that somebody back there was alive and kicking and paying attention, and that's a good thing because. . .

Had they waited
For settings more promising,
You wouldn't be here,
Wishing things were different.

Yeah. Take that, kids. This little verse has the voice of a Calvinist. Quitjerbitchin'.

Why not delight at how young they were
When they made the most of their chances,
How young still, a little later,
When they bought a double plot
At the cemetery.

Ouch. I'm 62 and we haven't made such plans.

Look at you,
Twice as old now as they were
When they made arrangements,
And still you're thinking of moving on,
Of finding a town with a climate
Friendlier to your many talents.

Maybe I better cool it on the retirement plans.

Don't be ashamed of the homely thought
That whatever you might do elsewhere,
In the time remaining, you might do here
If you can resolve, at last, to pay attention.

I don't know that my students would get it, but, dear Lord, I do. Think lillies. Pay attention.

I believe, Lord--help thou my unbelief.