Pressing Pause for Poetry: Joe Mills

My dad sent me this poem via email this week, saying I might like it or want to use it on my blog...and yes, I do like it, and yes, I am going to use it on my blog, so thanks, Dad! It's about a daughter asking her dad about love, and although he has so many things he could say about it, in the end he doesn't say much at all...

I'm definitely going to have to get Joe Mills' latest book of poems and check him out--I like this poem too much not to! So take a moment to press pause and enjoy...

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How Do You Know

How do you know if it’s love? she asks,
and I think if you have to ask, it’s not,
but I know this won’t help. I want to say
you’re too young to worry about it,
as if she has questions about Medicare
or social security, but this won’t help either.
“You’ll just know” is a lie, and one truth,
“when you still want to be with them
the next morning” would involve too
many follow-up questions. The difficulty
with love, I want to say, is sometimes
you only know afterwards that it’s arrived
or left. Love is the elephant and we
are the blind mice unable to understand
the whole. I want to say love is this
desire to help even when I know I can’t,
just as I couldn’t explain electricity, stars,
the color of the sky, baldness, tornadoes,
fingernails, coconuts, or the other things
she has asked about over the years, all
those phenomena whose daily existence
seems miraculous. Instead I shake my head.
I don’t even know how to match my socks.
Go ask your mother. She laughs and says,
I did. Mom told me to come and ask you.

Pretty great, yes? Have a wonderful weekend and try to find a bit of time for self care :)

Namaste,
Mary Catherine

P.S. I'll be in West Virginia at a teacher retreat tonight and tomorrow, so won't be posting on Sunday...see you Monday!