Timing

Timing is everything
Unless the gift is late
Then it’s the thought that counts

A stitch in time saves nine
lives of cats…
clouds to which we go
with hearts of joy

Timing turns the strange comedic
Embarrassment to entertainment
The quirky to appropriate

The right words are often late
But jump on the opportunity
And those in the audience
are in awe…
you thought on your feet

Blinking and swallowing
Don’t have the same effect
-A reason to be centered
Focused on your game
available when opportunity knocks

You could write a poem
Of clichés
(This is a good start)
As cliches are expressions
whose time has past
over-the-hill phrases
which in their day
inspired thought
Gave glee
brought laughter
caused the utterer to imagine herself
quoted in Bartlett’s book

Style is timing
Knowing the latest
What’s in circulation
What’s going on…

Take a three-week trip to Paris
And upon your return
folks at home
may be singing new jingles
talking new computing
You need a refresher course
no matter how rich the culture you visited

Consider my daughter
Who arrived the last days of ‘81
Reagan was shot that year
Lennon the year before
Mount St. Helens blew the year before
Who knows where Halley’s comet was
Or the number of Apollo launched
Fogelberg sang Run for the Roses
and the Leader of the Band
Jordan was poised to go swoosh
Mario Cuomo would make his two-cities
speech in a couple of years
The 1982 World’s Fair
migrated to Knoxville, Tennessee

It was 6:18 Eastern Standard Time
Wednesday, December 30, 1981
She arrived
With Mamaw and me waiting
wheeled out under glass
like a dark pheasant
with eyes surveying
the white cotton surface
belly button injured
skin pink like balsam wood

I picked her up like tissue paper
Two hands one too much
The yellow-tinted pictures
Of me holding her
who took those pictures?
kindly hospital staff?
Show my glasses wider than her body
With ear pieces the girth
Of little fingers

Being small as an infant
is no point of pride
It’s routine
What’s special is the reduced
average of two

Looking at a newborn
is like being present at your own birth
So similar are first arrivals
A new person on the planet

The heavens released
Light shone in the Eastern sky…
But wise men made no trek
Instead Uncles Roger, Benny and JR
Spent the weekend

We drove to Gatlinburg
bought an infant-sized T-shirt
spray painted pink with the title, Stephanie
Just after Christmas
thirty hours on the clock
until the next year
tax break secured
Three weeks after Christmas vacation began
Two weeks before the next quarter

Tanga got an A for Timing