A Poem For A Wednesday

Wednesday, August 7, 2013

   Next Time
   Joyce Sutphen

   I'll know the names of all of the birds
   and flowers, and not only that, I'll
   tell you the name of the piano player
   I'm hearing right now on the kitchen
   radio, but I won't be in the kitchen,

   I'll be walking a street in
   New York or London, about
   to enter a coffee shop where people
   are reading or working on their
   laptops. They'll look up and smile.

   Next time I won't waste my heart
   on anger; I won't care about
   being right. I'll be willing to be
   wrong about everything and to
   concentrate on giving myself away.

   Next time, I'll rush up to people I love,
   look into their eyes, and kiss them, quick.
   I'll give everyone a poem I didn't write,
   one specially chosen for that person.
   They'll hold it up and see a new
   world. We'll sing the morning in,

   and I will keep in touch with friends
   writing long letters when I wake from
   a dream where they appear on the
   Orient Express. "Meet me in Istanbul,"
   I'll say, and they will.

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