I know, I should throw it away ... at the very least, not wear it in public.
But I can't bear to give it up. It's my hat. We've been together so long, through so many things. It's like a part of me. And there it sits, "like a cabbage leaf on my head."
The poem began, as many poems do, while I was out walking, this time with Phyllis.
Actually, we encountered two young girls, strolling in the opposite direction. Strangers, but I probably smiled and spoke to them.
One of them smiled and said something in reply, but I didn't catch what it was.
After we had walked far enough that I thought we were out of earshot of the two, I asked Phyllis: "What did she say?"
"Cool hat," she replied.
"Cool hat?"
"That's right. Cool hat," she assured me.
That's when I had the impulse to toss my hat in the air and do a few dance steps right there. Who says I'm not in touch with the younger generation?
Today's poem, part of a manuscript in search of a publisher:
COOL HAT
It has been
wind-stripped,
limb-grabbed,
lost and found,
rumpled, crumpled,
laundered until
it cries for mercy,
and it sits like
a cabbage leaf
on my head.
But then she,
a young girl about
half my height,
flashes a smile,
says, "Cool hat!"
and for a moment,
just a heartbeat,
a quickened stride,
I feel like
tossing my hat
in the air
and dancing.
(orignally published in Capper's)
Today's word: heartbeat
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