First by Carrie Fountain

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend October 30, 2015   First   Carrie Fountain

There is a holiness to exhaustion is what I keep telling myself, filling out the form so my TA gets paid then making copies of it on the hot and heaving machine, writing Strong start! on a pretty bad poem. And then the children: the baby’s mouth opening, going for the breast, the girl’s hair to wash tonight and then comb so painstakingly in the tub while conditioner drips in slick globs onto her shoulders, while her discipline chart flaps in the air conditioner at school, taped to a filing cabinet, longing for stickers. My heart is so giant this evening, like one of those moons so full and beautiful and terrifying if you see it when you’re getting out of the car you have to go inside the house and make someone else come out and see it for themselves. I want every- thing, I admit. I want yes of course and I want it all the time. I want a clean heart. I want the children to sleep and the drought to end. I want the rain to come down—It’s supposed to monsoon is what Naomi said, driving away this morning, and she was right, as usual. It’s monsooning. Still, I want more. Even as the streets are washed clean and then begin to flood. Even though the man came again today to check the rat traps and said he bet we’d catch the rat within 24 hours. We still haven’t caught the rat, so I’m working at the table with my legs folded up beneath me. I want to know what is holy— I do. But first I want the rat to die. I am thirsty for that death and will drink deeply of that victory, the thwack of the trap’s hard plastic jaw, I will rush to see the evidence no matter how gruesome, leaning my body over the washing machine to see the thing crushed there, much smaller than I’d imagined it’d be, the strawberry large in its mouth.            Copyright © 2015 by Carrie Fountain. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   “I write and read poems in lieu of a more perfect spiritual practice. In this poem, I wanted to explore the moral and spiritual implications of our everyday actions and desires, which are often complicated and hardly ever perfect.” —Carrie Fountain   Carrie Fountain is the author of Instant Winner (Penguin Books, 2014). She is a writer-in-residence at St. Edward’s University and lives in Austin, Texas. Poetry by Fountain   Instant Winner (Penguin Books, 2014) "To Bring the Horse Home" by Julie Bruck "Want" by Rusty Morrison "Acts of Mind" by Catherine Barnett Poem-a-Day   Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-a-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends. Thanks for being a part of the Academy of American Poets community. To learn about other programs, including National Poetry Month, Poem in Your Pocket Day, the annual Poets Forum, and more, visit Poets.org.   You are receiving this e-mail because you elected to subscribe to our mailing list. If you would like to unsubscribe, please click here.   © Academy of American Poets 75 Maiden Lane, Suite 901, New York, NY 10038