Dishwashing Poem

I referred yesterday to a poem I found and saved.  About washing dishes, of all things.  :)

If you want to see day 4 1/2 of NYC (New York public library, an attempt at the Tenement Museum, Chrysler Building lobby, and getting lost), see here.

I'm off on a mini date with two of my kiddos.  It was going to be just one, but the other one tried to get my attention by cleaning two bathrooms and mopping a room.  Ha ha.  I think he got my attention.  Cute.  I was trying to be really firm so a little girl could get some time with just me (I'm going to take each of them on a date before school starts), but I figure I can take her when the others are in school.  

(my kids were roughly this old at writing.  time is just flying too fast!)

I Saw Happiness

I saw happiness that

Morning

In a sink of dish washing

Suds

As my four year-old

Burst in to tell me

That our

Bleeding-Heart-had-bloomed-and-it’s-in-the-shape-of-a-heart

Is-that-why-it’s-called-a-bleeding-heart-and-I-saw-a-cool-bug

I-named-it-a-dragon-bug-what-do-dragon-bugs-do?

Then, leaving me to my thoughts,

His hair standing up quizzically in the back,

I smiled within myself as

The door muffled his receding

tromp-tromp-tromp.

Then through the kitchen window,

A perfect view

Of his sister,

Throwing her

Bouncy ball into the air with all her might,

Little arms barely clearing her head.

First trying the grass,

Then finding a better spot in the

Scrawled yesterday’s painted sidewalk,

Filled with

Bright blue and yellow balloons,

Rockets,

And a rudimentary hopscotch.

And I remembered that I’d given up

Office work,

Kayaking,

And a world championship in the hurdles,

Subjected my body to stretch marks,

Varicose veins, and sleep deprivation experiments

(thinking as I read her Pooh that my head too was stuffed with fluff)

To watch my baby sleep,

Her soft breath moving in and out,

A two year-old throw her blue ball, unaware of observation,

And a crouching four year-old wonder at the latest

Wandering bug.

I laughed inside myself

To discover that

Happiness had somehow found me

Inside a bowl of rainbow-

swirling dish suds

As the sun filtered through the

Kitchen window

On a late Thursday

Afternoon.

As always, suggestions appreciated!  Happy Friday!