A Few Consoling Words To My Vacuum Cleaner
Yes, I know, it’s not Saturday,
the day I usually take you from your
dark closet to clean the rugs.
I thought I’d have a friendly chat
with you and reminisce, ask how you’re doing,
your health, and let you know
how much your services are appreciated,
and how you’ve lived up to everything
said about you the dayI bought you,
placed you in the car trunk and sped
you to my home for domestic work
where you’ve lived up to all my expectations,
always with an obliging ready compliance.
Nothing pricks my conscience more
than, after a morning of diligent work,
I have to return you to the darkness of
a claustrophobic utiliy closet
crowded with so many household helpers
with unpleasant and toxic fumes, and not
once have you ever complained, and to my shame
and negligence never once did I apologize
or offer you even a perfunctory thank you,
leaving you to yourself and your thoughts,
holding only a bag of sucked up dirt
filled with dog hair, food crumbs, and who knows
what else you found lurking in my rugs,
until your services were needed again.
Solitude, of course, can be a blessing
and has advantages when it has purpose.
It’s indispensable to poets and writers
who need an atmosphere of quiet to think
and meditate. Even medieval monks,
confined to small stone cells, required
solitude. How else could they have
produced such magnificent illuminated
manuscripts? Or, as one monk did,
combine his Christian theology with
Aristotle’s philosophy, though less cerebral monks,
and others, overwhelmed with
the monotony of repetitious prayers,
penance, and nightly flagelations
to combat the lustful flesh, as an alternative,
spent hours without distraction
calculating how many angels could fit
or dance on the head of a pin.
Copyright © Maurice Rigoler | Year Posted 2023
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