Something Will Happen that You Cannot Control

Probably shouldn’t say “full bush”
to someone I’ve just met. Sorry.

It’s like chopping cabbage in the mincer
after making vanilla biscuits.

Like scouring the sink with shea butter
until the sponge is soft as brie.

If I didn’t know the words weak chin
I wouldn’t see his on him.

When the weather clears, I could name
what to clean, not what’s dirty.

On the brand new slough
geese honk like gossip. Geese gawk

like a middle grade brass band
the moment preceding the moment

Mr. D threw his baton
at the ducking trumpet section.

I’ve eaten peanut butter for breakfast.
Cleared basements with bells and sage.

This cup will never understand me
or coffee, but together we are good

at waiting. When I say
my car is iced outside

I don’t mean my car is a lemon cake
and yet I would now like a piece of cake

to eat one-handed while my neighbor
walks by as she does every morning,

home from the Shell with her pack
of ice cold.

 

With a line from The Five Obstructions by Lars Von Trier

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KATE LEBO‘s poems and essays have appeared in Best New Poets, The New England Review, The Rumpus, Gastronomica, Willow Springs, and Poetry Northwest. She’s also the author of two books about the folk art of piemaking: A Commonplace Book of Pie (Chin Music Press) and Pie School: Lessons in Fruit, Flour, and Butter (Sasquatch Books). She’s a graduate of the poetry programs at Western Washington University and the University of Washington. For more, visit katelebo.com.