Thoughts I've thunk while sippin' at a cup of tea and reading something provoking, often get dropped here for the benefit of humanity and my own hubris.
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Anita pointed me to this poem by Thomas Lux, entitled Refrigerator, 1957. It’s a great poem, and I think I would rank this as one of my favorites as well… but my thoughts inspired by this poem are a bit different than Anita’s.
A good poem is not a series of unintelligible words… but it isn’t something that is completely digested after the first reading. It is the kind that inspires with an initial meaning, but with the hint of deeper riches.
My first thoughts on this poem were about how we often have all these “dull dinners” and never get around to using the good stuff. My wife’s grandmother recently died, and her place (just like my grandmothers) was full of things still in their original packages. A pair of gloves… never used. A dress… dusty, but not worn. Slippers that she could have used, but chose to save them for a later time since her current ones only had a single hole in both soles. It is almost as if the saving of the slippers gave her more pleasure than using them… than watching them fall apart like her current pair… like her.
But we all have cherries inside the refrigerator door of our souls. Placed there from our ancestors, like a charm bracelet, like genes, like the stories in the baggage of our culture. Giving us a future hope of pleasure against the current drone of misery and pain.
Shouldn’t that just inspire us to make a drink or an ice cream sundae? Shouldn’t we do that before we can’t?
Why don’t we? Excuse me, I have a fish bone stuck in my throat from the last lines of the poem…
They were beautiful
and, if I never ate one,
it was because I knew it might be missed
or because I knew it would not be replaced
and because you do not eat
that which rips your heart with joy.
I guess we just think that the hope is better than the momentary joy.
© 2004-2005, Howard Abrams • Except where otherwise noted, all original content is licensed under a Creative Commons License (see details).
I’m glad you like this poem so much! Yes, it did take our thoughts in different directions. Because of the year 1957 in the title, my first thought was he perfectly captured the era of the 50’s, the American move to the suburbs, all the empty places that has led to. Having heard him read the poem, I don’t think my interpretation is what he intended, but it’s what I connect to most in the poem. But there’s a lot going on in this poem — as you said “hint of deeper riches.”
Comment posted on Saturday, 14 February 2004
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