THE BROOM

She starts the day,
Greeting the mosaics one by one,
Stirring them in their calling as mirrors.
What joy to scatter so much night,
To erase so many rings under eyes,
To make the shadows leave in flight!
What a job hers, setting in motion
The linked activity of the things we love,
And they have almost managed to become us,
Lend us features, even a name,
The labored name of our preferences,
Earned with bare hands from years,
Building a face of surprises
With the flow of each instant,
The name we choose through that cosmos
Of Habits and familiar belongings,
More real than the other given us by our parents.
And how a chore so floored
Can produce a dawn so difficult!
She preludes the orchestrated swarm
Of taps, the water's music,
The good days of oiled hinges,
Swaying her amazon breed
In passages, on patios and pavements,
Happy as a harp
Playing in the energy of two arms.
If only her press for purity could clean away
Stabbing ice, grim cries
And clouds of ash.
If she could at least take the dirt from our eyes
So we could see the linked light
Striking the walls outside and our foreheads.
The broom also feels misfortunes,
At times sweeping up tears
And the broken windowpanes of dreams,
And even genuine pieces of herself,
The useless feet of her hope,
Dead now the wish of walking by herself.
But without her Cindrella hustling,
The house could never get up,
Nor welcome friends,
Nor serve as a horse for the little ones.
For there is a great deal of grandmother
In the humanity of a broom.