The Personal
I who have loved the personal
have fallen a bit out of love
with the personal.
I have never
owned a pair of slippers.
I recently realized my feet are cold.
I think I’ll buy slippers, I said
to myself and then my son,
over the phone, just for the sake
of conversation. I wasn’t asking
for his permission or anything.
Why do you want slippers? he asked.
I’m cold, I said. You’re cold?
What’s wrong with you? he asked.
like an accusation.
I don’t like it when you’re suddenly cold.
You sound like Ha-hoo, he said.
Ha-hoo was my grandmother.
I sent him a photo of some slippers
that didn’t seem too bad. They look
like Ha-hoo, he said. You’re
folding. You’re caving, he said.
Get this, he’s had slippers
for years. But I’m supposed to be
some sort of paragon. The slippers
I am maybe going to buy are the kind
that you can just your foot into.
Don’t get those, my son said.
You’ll fall down the stairs.
Thanks for the vote of confidence,
I said. He sent me a photo of some fake
moccasins lined with rabbit fur.
Get these he said.
You’ve got to be kidding me,
I said. He knew I’d reject them
for being appropriative. And think
of the poor rabbit. He was playing
mind games. He learned that from
his years on the streets.
I picture myself in a broken heap
at the bottom of the stairs.
Then I picture Ha-hoo skinning a rabbit.
Women back then had to have cold
hearts. James Joyce told me
the reason my milk wasn’t coming in
after I gave birth was because
I’d washed greens for what seemed
like hours with my hands in ice cold water.
Everybody knows ice water dries up
your supply, she said, like I was a factory
or something. I miss the days when I had
a grandmother and no one personalized
anything I did. I’d sit in her closet
and put pebbles in her high heels
and she never said a word. My feet
were like hot coals back then.
I could go outside in the winter
without shoes and with every step
the snow would hiss and melt.
If I had an insight, I’d keep it bottled up
until it disappeared, and I didn’t
have that many insights, Imagine
it. One pair of red shoes and no
slippers. My mind was empty
as a ballroom and I was not
compelled to dance.
by Diane Seuss
from Modern Poetry
Graywolf Press, 2024
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