Broken Flower
(or Problem In The Car Line)
By Theodore Richards
emails sent
discussions had
about the problem
the delay
in the car line at school pick-up
why do you take so long to come out?
why don’t you just come down right away
like your sister
like the other kids?
but then you arrive
tall & proud & smiling & indifferent
to time & discussions & emails & car lines
a flower in your hand
bent & broken
my flower was broken,
you explain,
& i was trying to fix it.
(i remember, at that moment, a woman in Zimbabwe who was always late to class walking up the rugged path with jug of water on her head, straight and proud:
she could never be late for a class that couldn’t start without her; she could learn any lesson we were trying to teach except for the one we were really teaching: how to buy and sell her time.)
my flower was broken,
& i was trying to fix it.
& i realize the yours was a greater problem
than a backed-up car line
than anywhere I have to go
than any email a teacher might send
than really all the important things people do all day.
i realize
that as long as you can hold a broken flower in your hand
your heart
as long as you can hold the broken things of this world
even when they are beyond repair
that you will always come to me
straight & strong & unbroken.
and we can all wait for that.
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