The Little Things by Caroline Ketelhohn

Holes in the Roof
Caroline Ketelhohn

I wish I had a little house all to myself
I’d punch holes in the roof
For the sun to pour through
And no one would be able to find me

The city’s shrinking out the window now
Am I shrinking instead?
The Greek boy is a statue now
Fitting, for a Greek boy
I wish that I’d shrink faster
That the city’d disappear
I want to leave, I want to stay
But I can’t stay, but I don’t want to go

But maybe if I left I could escape

The memory of hands on me
I didn’t want them on me
Being out in public and forgetting how to breathe
Fingers shaking so much I can’t even hold my pencil
I can’t even hold my fork when I eat

But then again

Every time I board that northern bound plane
I feel the burning pain of abandon

Hold on

Why is this cut on my leg so vibrantly red?

In any case,

I wish I had a little house, just for myself
I would punch holes in the roof
The sun would pour through
No one would be able to find me

A Bird, came down the Walk
Emily Dickinson

A Bird, came down the Walk -
He did not know I saw -
He bit an Angle Worm in halves
And ate the fellow, raw,

And then, he drank a Dew
From a convenient Grass -
And then hopped sidewise to the Wall
To let a Beetle pass -

He glanced with rapid eyes,
That hurried all abroad -
They looked like frightened Beads, I thought,
He stirred his Velvet Head. -

Like one in danger, Cautious,
I offered him a Crumb,
And he unrolled his feathers,
And rowed him softer Home -

Than Oars divide the Ocean,
Too silver for a seam,
Or Butterflies, off Banks of Noon,
Leap, plashless as they swim.

You Are Jeff
#14
Richard Siken

After work you go to the grocery store to get some milk and a carton of cigarettes. Where did you
get those bruises? You don’t remember. Work was boring. You find a jar of bruise cream and a can
of stewed tomatoes. Maybe a salad? Spinach, walnuts, blue cheese, apples, and you can’t decide
between the Extra Large or Jumbo black olives. Which is bigger anyway? Extra Large has a blue
label, Jumbo has a purple label. Both cans cost $1.29. While you’re deciding, the afternoon light is
streaming through the windows behind the bank of checkout counters. Take the light inside you
like a blessing, like a knee in the chest, holding onto it and not letting it go. Now let it go.

From Blossoms
Li-Young Lee

From blossoms comes
this brown paper bag of peaches
we bought from the boy
at the bend in the road where we turned toward
signs painted Peaches.

From laden boughs, from hands,
from sweet fellowship in the bins,
comes nectar at the roadside, succulent
peaches we devour, dusty skin and all,
comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat.

O, to take what we love inside,
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into
the round jubilance of peach.

There are days we live
as if death were nowhere
in the background; from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.

The Cure
Ginger Andrews

Lying around all day
with some strange new deep blue
weekend funk, I’m not really asleep
when my sister calls
to say she’s just hung up
from talking with Aunt Bertha
who is 89 and ill but managing
to take care of Uncle Frank
who is completely bed ridden.
Aunt Bert says
it’s snowing there in Arkansas,
on Catfish Lane, and she hasn’t been
able to walk out to their mailbox.
She’s been suffering
from a bad case of the mulleygrubs.
The cure for the mulleygrubs,
she tells my sister,
is to get up and bake a cake.
If that doesn’t do it, put on a red dress.

Fragment 94
Sappho

I just really want to die.
She, crying many tears, left me
And said to me:
"Oh, how terribly we have suffered, we two,
Sappho, really I don't want to go away."
And I said to her this:
Go and be happy, remembering me,
For you know how we cared for you.
And if you don't I want to remind you
.............and the lovely things we felt
with many wreathes of violets
and ro(ses and cro)cuses
and.............. and you sat next to me
and threw around your delicate neck
garlands fashioned of many woven flowers
and with much...............costly myrrh
..............and you anointed yourself with royal.....
and on soft couches.......(your) tender.......
fulfilled your longing..........

Happiness
Raymond Carver

So early it's still almost dark out.
I'm near the window with coffee,
and the usual early morning stuff
that passes for thought.
When I see the boy and his friend
walking up the road
to deliver the newspaper.
They wear caps and sweaters,
and one boy has a bag over his shoulder.
They are so happy
they aren't saying anything, these boys.
I think if they could, they would take
each other's arm.
It's early in the morning,
and they are doing this thing together.
They come on, slowly.
The sky is taking on light,
though the moon still hangs pale over the water.
Such beauty that for a minute
death and ambition, even love,
doesn't enter into this.
Happiness. It comes on
unexpectedly. And goes beyond, really,
any early morning talk about it.

The Orange
Wendy Cope

At lunchtime I bought a huge orange—
The size of it made us all laugh.
I peeled it and shared it with Robert and Dave—
They got quarters and I had a half.

And that orange, it made me so happy,
As ordinary things often do
Just lately. The shopping. A walk in the park.
This is peace and contentment. It’s new.

The rest of the day was quite easy.
I did all the jobs on my list
And enjoyed them and had some time over.
I love you. I’m glad I exist.

Sometimes life seems too big. There’s so much of it, it’s too complex, too much to handle, and
trying to think about it all at once makes you cry. Sometimes you want to escape to a little house all
for yourself, with lots of sunlight streaming in. Sometimes the thought of a stream of sunlight
makes you cry too.

Life can be overwhelming, but that’s if you blind yourself to what’s good, to what’s
real—the simple beauty of it all. If you take time to look around you and appreciate the little things,
you’ll see that happiness is dispersed throughout them all.

On a day like any other, you could take time to watch a bird hop around and live its own life,
and you’ll find a world completely separate from your own. Emily Dickinson did this—when “a Bird,
came down the Walk… drank a Dew… hopped sidewise to the Wall… And he unrolled his
feathers”—and wrapped the innocent story up in the familiar, comforting vessel of ABCB quatrains,
for nothing but a passive, playful pleasure. She knew there was no need to think about it all too
much, nor attach the weight of existential meaning to it. Not everything has to be complex. It’s
enough to pay attention to the little things around us, to enjoy another’s existence and lessen the
burden of our own. When we go through the routine of grocery shopping—Richard Siken’s prose
narration contributing to the colornessless and melancholy—life may seem empty, but then we
take note of “the afternoon light… streaming through the windows behind the bank of checkout
counters,” and suddenly there’s hope of something more. We take the light inside us “like a
blessing.” We indulge in the pleasure of our produce purchase—“hold the fruit in our hands, adore
it, then bite into the round jubilance of peach,” in Li-Young Lee’s words—and are happy, for that
moment. But afterward, we’re reminded that that small yet adored item is only one “sweet,
impossible blossom” that momentarily distracts us from the inevitability of death, always “in the
background.”

At times, life seems like a drab affair, with the hints of joy throughout being futile. But life
is not, by default, drab. When we feel that way, that’s just “the mulleygrubs,” as defined by Ginger
Andrews. “The cure for the mulleygrubs… is to get up and bake a cake. If that doesn’t do it, put on a
red dress.” It seems amazing that small things like that can renew our faith in life, but it’s not. Small
things like that are what human beings are supposed to be focused on. This has always been the
case; the centuries-old expression of the sentiment proves it. Circa 600 BC, when Sappho parted
with a tearful lover, she told her to remember when they strung around their “neck garlands
fashioned of many woven flowers.” Society—with its many complications and destructive
obligations—forced them apart, but at least they had that memory of flowers around their necks to
console them.

It seems like such an easy, simple notion, but then why does the heart ache with longing at
the thought of it? It’s so easy to be happy. The way human society is constructed makes us think
we’re not entitled to it, that we have to throw ourselves completely at our other obligations. But at
times of difficulty, what we long for are the easy moments. Bake a cake, put on a red dress, pick up
some flowers, and in the future, you’ll remember that in those moments you were happy.

People have always been people. There are parts missing from Sappho’s fragment 94—lost
to time and translation—but regardless, it is clear from her writing that true happiness and love are
not complex nor quantitative, but rather, made up of the small pleasures of the moment.

“Happiness,” Raymond Carver says, “comes on unexpectedly. And goes beyond, really, any
early morning talk about it.” He saw two boys delivering newspapers in the morning, and they
weren’t even saying anything, but he knew they were so happy, just “doing this thing together.”

Happiness is not a problem to be solved; you shouldn't have to work your whole life to get
there. If you think of it that way, you won’t see that it’s everywhere around you. It’s a human right,
as much as life and liberty are. You just need to embrace it—to breathe it in like air.

There are moments—ones like any other—where you realize you don’t hurt anywhere, that
you’re happy. And it’s a heart wrenching epiphany for something so simple. Wendy Cope felt it and
realized “This is peace and contentment. ” It’s so difficult for us, but so easy—to acknowledge the
bird on the walk, the afternoon light through the window, a yummy peach, the fun of baking a cake,
of stringing flowers together, an early morning walk with the sky taking on light, a particular
orange—to feel the content roll over us, having been there all along, and be able to say “I’m glad I
exist.”