This Day
By: Lucinda Trew
Wake
by a clock that aches
from the rote of rotation,
the weight of the
sameness
of days.
Pale light seeps,
slow as motor oil,
dissolving the divide
between dream
and dawn.
A sour sigh, a stretch,
nighttime regret
washed away,
almost,
by blond beams flickering
across floor, stirring
dust
and hope,
rising.
Feet on the floor,
dog out the door.
Glaze of spilt eggs on the counter,
sleeve catching
the butter dish,
the clatter of
caffeine.
Disarray before order,
fall before grace.
Affirmation before
the bathroom mirror:
All things good and true.
Abundance and ease.
Peace and profundity.
Amen.
From your tooth-pasted
lips
to God’s ear.
Rinse.
The order of things:
A list.
To write, read, resolve.
To do and do over.
Do better. Do right
by yesterday,
and all of the rust-rimmed days
before.
Days that began golden
and swirly
like this one. This day.
Swelling with held breath,
a tethered balloon,
straining for sky.
The order of things:
Creation and chaos.
Email, pay bills,
thaw something on a plate
placed over the egg and butter stain.
Look out the window
at a garden jumble.
Pull weeds, plant seeds.
Breathe.
A deadline to meet.
Write, edit, send.
Amend.
Fold fraying towels
to clear your head,
inhale
laundry smell.
Breathe.
The order of things:
Run.
Run to
or run from.
No pain, no gain.
The tears are from
wind,
pollen,
scratchy contacts.
Not pain.
Not this day.
Not now.
Wave.
The order of things:
Cook the thawed chicken.
Add lemon, capers,
anoint
with Chardonnay.
Unruly simmer and splatter.
The jangle of homework, T.V.
Clean towels to put away,
or wrap around,
or wipe up the remains
of this day.
This day, sidling away
slyly,
Winding down,
Rhyming down.
Spent.
This day.
Lucinda Trew lives and writes in Charlotte, N.C. She earned English and Journalism degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her work has been published in The Fredricksburg Literary and Arts Journal, Medium, The Mighty, Charlotte ViewPoint, BluntMoms, Boomer Cafe and Vital Speeches of the Day.