A quick post this morning as I dash off to teach 5th graders at The Hilliard Museum. The museums in Lafayette are hosting 5th graders this month, and I have the privilege of doing the creative writing portion of their tour. It’s fun to be teaching again.
Susan Thomsen challenged poet-teacher folks to write after Donika Kelly’s poem “Poem to Remind Myself of the Natural Order of Things.” The challenge was to write about a popular viral video, but I went rogue and wrote a poem to remind myself why I retired.
This was a quick draft in the early pre-dawn hour.
Poem to Remind Myself of the Reason I Retired
after Donika Kelly
Observe the sun rise
over the bayou where water
evaporates into a misty cloud.
Open the door to the scent
of sweet olive and look
for a chickadee nest.
Call your daughter
while she drives to work.
She has time to talk honestly
without background kid noise.
She speaks the words,
“I love you.”
O Margaret, you are still yourself.
Margaret Simon, draft
Reflections on the Teche 