Generosity

for James Crews

There are some for whom chores are sacred;
they accept each gift of laundry—weeks of dorm grime
schlepped home in molding duffle bags—
fold reverence into each fresh-from-the-dryer seam.

They bake their own bread—meditate while it proves,
or whip up seven different kinds of salads,
each family dinner, a communion of leafy greens.
A firmly tucked sheet, a gleaming guest tub—

all acts of domestic devotion, an enlightenment
I’ve failed to achieve. I remain agnostic,
scoff even, at the notion of grace awaiting
in the depths of the daily grind.

When the grey mouse arrives during the cold snap,
I am unmoved by any spirit of cleanliness
to lay out sticky-traps, cannot face that moment
of anointing his little paws with vegetable oil

to set him free. Instead, I listen to him scritch
his way across countertops—crackle of cellophane,
clink of spoons in an unwashed bowl. Sometimes,
I’ll offer up a strawberry, a cheddar Triscuit—

just a little something for comfort in the night.

*

Hayley Mitchell Haugen is a Professor of English at Ohio University Southern. Light & Shadow, Shadow & Light from Main Street Rag (2018) is her first full-length poetry collection, and her chapbook, What the Grimm Girl Looks Forward To is from Finishing Line Press (2016). Her latest chapbook, The Blue Wife Poems, is from Kelsay Books (2022). She edits Sheila-Na-Gig online and Sheila-Na-Gig Editions.