Ordering a Poem
The speaker says you can’t order a poem like you order this food.
What is a taco?
Poems are sleeping in the bottoms of these.
What are our shoes?
The man gave his wife two of these for Valentine’s Day.
What are skunks?
The main theme is that beauty and meaning can be found in this.
What is anything?
The speaker suggests checking your garage for poems.
What is a garage?
The speaker jokes that you can’t walk up to the counter and say this.
What is I'll take two?
Poems are also described as shadows drifting across this place.
What is the ceiling?
The wife reacted by doing this.
What is crying?
The poem suggests the world has conditioned people not to see beauty in these things.
What are simple/ordinary things?
Poems might be found in this lonely clothing item in your drawer.
What is an off sock?
The speaker says poems won’t be handed back to you on this kind of plate.
What is a shiny plate?
Poems appear in the moment before we do this.
What is wake up?
The man thought the skunks had beautiful this.
What are eyes?
The speaker believes poems come from how someone looks at the world.
What is perspective?
The speaker suggests even this person could contain poetry.
Who is the person you almost like, but not quite?
The poem begins with a humorous comparison to show poems aren’t something you can do this with.
What is buy/order easily?
The speaker says we must live in a way that lets us do this.
What is find poems?
The man is described as being very serious and living in this way.
What is a serious way?
The speaker says poems have been hiding in skunks’ eyes for this long.
What is centuries?
The speaker says we find poems if we do this with whatever life gives us.
What is re-invent it?
The tone in the first stanza is mostly this.
What is humorous/playful?
The poem’s theme suggests poetry can be found in this kind of place.
What is everyday life/ordinary things?
The skunks became beautiful because the man did this to them.
What is re-invented them as valentines?
The poem teaches that poetry is not ordered — it is this.
What is discovered/found?
The poem ends with the speaker asking the reader to do this.
What is let me know?