Circumventing the Busy Self

 

What I need tonight is a chair—
the big upholstered kind
that sighs when I sit into it,
the kind that holds me the way
I used to imagine a cloud would hold me—
downy, cozy, comfy, secure
and filled with light.
I need a chair that will make me
not want to get up to do
whatever important thing
I think I must do.
Why do I always think I need
to do something? Why
is it so hard to just sit?
So, I guess, what I really need is a chair
and a seatbelt, the kind
they have on helicopters
with five straps that meet
in the center—though
I think those are self-release,
and we all know I will soon
feel driven to rise and rush,
no matter how cumulonimbus-ish
that chair might feel, no matter
how insistent the straps.
So tonight, what I really need
is a soft chair and a five-strap seat belt
and a giant weighted blanket—
not heavy enough to crush me,
but one with enough gravity
that being still feels like the only
real choice. And if I am still, very still,
and not accomplishing anything for a while,
then perhaps I will meet this grief
I am escaping—not that I am trying
to escape it on purpose, it’s just
there is so much important
stuff to do and, perhaps,
let’s say I’ve noticed that when I just sit,
just sit,
with nothing to read and nothing
to do, the grief sits with me
and asks nothing of me except
that I meet it. In that moment,
I remember turning toward grief
is what I most want to do.
In that moment, there is nothing
on any to do list that could deter me
from meeting this grief.
Oh world, I remember.
I remember right now,
so please, what I need most tonight,
it doesn’t matter how soft,
is a chair.

--Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer