Nincompoop

I’m pressing a shirt
when the word nincompoop
puffs into my head like steam
from the iron in my grip. I wonder
if the cruel inner critic is mocking
my quotidian pursuits?

Sweep. Cook. Launder. Ponder.

I take a break to check the etymology
of nincompoop: from non compos mentis
to silly, it goes on and on. Nothing good.
I return to my task: press collar,
facing, cuff, sleeve, then the body
of the shirt, just as Mother taught me.

My bed? It’s already made.

*

Donna Hilbert’s latest book is Enormous Blue Umbrella, Moon Tide Press, 2025. Work has appeared in journals and broadcasts including Eclectica, Gyroscope, Rattle, Sheila Na Gig, ONE ART, Cholla Needles, TSPoetry, VerseDaily, Vox Populi, The Writer’s Almanac, anthologies including Boomer Girls, The Widows’ Handbook, The Poetry of Presence I & II, The Path to Kindness, The Wonder of Small Things, Love Is For All Of Us, What the House Knows, Poetry Goes The Movies. She writes and leads workshops from her home base in Long Beach, California.