(re-education)

I know so little.
Having emptied the stove
of its ashes,
I leave the bag by the front door,
until consultation determines
if I should dump it in the yard.

My compost pile
is not composting,
despite my diligent research,
and so I am driven to augment it
with store-bought worms.

Somehow it all seems so complex
and I can’t recall when exactly
it became so.
The world is a conspiracy
to do wrong.

To live a clean and simple life
requires constant re-education.
How to adjust the recipe for honey
and then you learn honey shouldn’t
be heated at all.
How to bake with kamut flour?
Where is the lawn seed
suitable for both shade and sun
that needs no water.

It’s something in me I think.
Other people seem more able
to take on all the details.
I have trouble with learning
that isn’t remembering,
the way we learn to speak.

As I am learning now,
rocking in my desk chair
remembering what I do,
coming to see how to do it
as I listen to the rain
on the roof.

11/10/97