Washington's Sunday Etude

Washington's Sunday Etude

it’s morning and the calendar
is set a page two days ago
I let the water run and lean
against one gleaming shower wall
still wondering where the evening went

I tend to write of things of which
I’m just peripherally part
as seen beyond a pane of glass
I am the eye behind the lens
and sit backstage to pull the strings

it’s morning and I’m wondering if
in twelve-point font, laid end to end
the poems that start with just "it’s morn-
-ing" would the earth’s circumference stretch
and so redeem this waste of words

I always dread the evenings’ ends
that pass somehow so unfulfilled
and so, from pocket’s depth I fish
one half-dead pen to scratch the tip
of feelings insufficiently expressed