Margie and Ted

Today it was too hot for us to go out for coffee, so I took with me a book of Ted Kooser’s poetry, Kindest Regards: New and Selected Poems (2019). I read her a marvelous sixteen-line poem called “Shoes,” which goes from the “smooth brown eggs of new shoes” to “old shoes with cracked faces.” Delightful. After I read it to her, I offered her the book and she read the same poem to me with pleasure. But it wasn’t quite what she was hankering for. 

“Does he ever write anything racy?” she asked, her cheeks pink with naughtiness.

Yes, I laughed. Yes, he does. So then I read her “Laundry.”

It begins with “A pink house trailer,/ scuffed and rusted” next to which is a clothes line with “five pale blue workshirts…sleeves wet with dew.” 

It ends,

and near them, a pair
of bright yellow panties, 
urging them on. 

Margie laughed and slapped both her thighs. “Yes, that’s terrific!” Then she read it to me. 

“That’s perfect! Urging them on!” She read it again, “bright yellow panties, urging them on.” 

*Note: I am being very careful not to violate copyright laws in any country, which is why I haven’t included the whole poem. Kd found a link to the full poem and another of Kooser's. Thank you, Kd.