99poems/ascending

My chair in the sunny
strip of the living room,
I watch the sun ascending
behind the eucalyptus.
As far south, or nearly so –
he has pointed out this morning –
as it will ever be, so bright
I almost need sunglasses
as I write.

8:02 a.m. on a Monday.
I hear the trash service and
wonder what was picked up first.
The newspapers, the cat food cans,
the household waste.
The one bottle we usually have
from my applesauce.
I have already visited my compost heap,
emptying the peels of yesterday’s soup
from the aluminum bowl.

He has left his lunch bag in the kitchen.
We realize it almost simultaneously,
for me when I am wiping the counter,
for him when it is too late to turn back,
when so much knowledge comes.

I hear the screech of the trash truck,
Of course, it is irrelevant
what container leaves first
it is just that persistent
need to know,
the unceasing urge to name.

1/11/99