On the Day after Thanksgiving

Penelope Scambly Schott

Last cottonwood leaves float on the creek

The lace tablecloth is laundered and folded

The arched turkey carcass boils in the soup pot

How lovely the sliced carrots, cadmium orange

Even the dog is full

The pumpkin out on the porch is starting to rot

I dial and dial everyone I love

For We Are as Water Spilt on the Ground

-2 Samuel 14:14

1

After the rains of March,
the worms rose from soaked dirt – 

pink corrugated worms digesting
their black news.

I woke up here,
inside the rinsed sky,

with the sound of one bird
singing all around me.

Oh, goodness, this world said,
oh, my gracious goodness.  Just look

at all these anonymous two-leafed
sprouts.

2

My lover left me.  Mom and Dad died. My wisest teachers got old and forgot.

The ancient oak rotted from inside. The stone wall fell.  But the sun rose

anyhow.  And new people happened.
Of course, they always start small.

Can you believe this story?
You’re in it too.

3

In the thread drawer
of my grandmother’s sewing chest,

I found these narrow brown shoelaces
rolled in printed paper.

They belong to a pair of shoes
I will never own,

but I walk around in those shoes
every day.