Potatoes and Poetry

I check out books of poetry

because I think
I want to be the kind of person

who reads poetry
and to use
my brain for more than
deciding dinner
and conciliating sibling squabbles
and three weeks later 
I find the books of poetry 
unread and forgotten.
As I pare potatoes
with a knife,
because the potato peeler has
gone missing
along with the remote control
a library book by Roald Dahl
most of the magnetic alphabet
and the waist I had when
I met my husband, 
I think
about the poetry I used to read
and the poetry I used to write
and I look down into the 
oceanic eyes of the 
tiny toddler 
clinging to my legs
as she gazes up at me
willing me
to pick her up
and nuzzle her downy hair
and breathe in the scent of 
innocent potential
and I know
my life is poetry.

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