I have been taking inventory of the facts.
Such marvellous facts,
such fiercely simple
fecund facts,
which I count
on my fingers,
and sometimes with ink,
and sometimes to the slow,
measured tempo
of my breathing
in and out.

For example, chickadees.
What a fact. And just today I counted
three more facts, which were
hash browns
unmerited kindness
and autumn, which you can hold in your hands.

I count these facts the way my grandmother
counts her jewels, which is to say
slowly
gently
urgently

so I watch her reach
into her purse
full of pretty
glittering things
and lay them down
one by one
on the neat, made-up
mattress.

She lays them down
and lets her eye
rest on them
lets her finger
brush against them
lets her heart
unlatch to love
and admit
them:

“Here are the pearl earrings
which I bought in eighty-six,
and here is a cross necklace made of white gold,
and did you know,” she says to me, “that this deep
teal opal ring looks like emerald under the sun?”

She says all this
with a hunger in her
eyes
a hunger in her
hands
a hunger in her
heart

(catching me off guard)

so I call it greed
but the greed is
something
holy. it is a
taking in. it is
a laying down. it is
a gratitude. it is a
discontent

catching me off guard.

So I have been
taking in/ventory
of the facts.
I count them
the facts
I count and count and count
the glittering of the world.

10.20.23