Have you ever had a poem, or in most cases, several poems, that defined you? Or spoke to you profoundly, or touched you seeringly, or that you held close inside you more than any others? Some grab your mind the first time and never let go, and some sneak up on you and make a quiet home in your heart. Thanks to Rob for giving me this sneaky one.


Today is Wednesday

which is the day I have decided to understand.
I have tried since morning.
Now for the second time
my shadow is longer than I am
and still I can't understand.

I have asked everyone to help me.
I ask the bus driver to help me.

He said, My name is John Foster Kelley
which is a name you will need.

I asked the waitress with mustard
on her mouth.
She said, I have a surgical
scar on my belly.

I asked a policeman. I said,
Today is Wednesday.
He said, Go ask your mother.
I asked my mother.

I never saw you before in my life

son.

Tomorrow is Thursday.
Thursday I will understand.
If I can find the right bus
the right cafe
I will say,
Somebody help me.

Friday I will find myself
the one who can help me.

I will recognize it at once,
breasts of a big woman
face of a dog
the hinder parts held high
as a camel rises
in the unheated intergalactic spaces
under the gray blanket of my
most dry dreams.

I will say, What about the whales?

and it will be done.
Friday I will do it myself.

Then I will tell everyone my understanding.
At first, of course, they will not hear,
and when they do they will not allow me near
inhabited places.
I will grow old sending in scribbled notes
tied to the teats of cows and the tails of goats.

- Miller Williams