Enjoy Your Release

You better grow the
greenest grass you can
find among the gravestones
and a few flowers and an
ornamental shrub or two.
It’s somber enough just
to think of all those
buried hopes in your
autumn days. Maybe one more
grave would bury self-pity
too and then you would
be free to enjoy your
release from calendar
and weather. You’ve worked off
your debt to might-have-been,
and tramped the regret
circuit long enough. Remember,
friend, the Preacher said that a
merry heart driveth away care,
a sad face drieth the bones.

 

    Original Citation

    Planting Red Geraniums: Discovered Poems of James Hearst. Final Thursday Press, 2017. 26.

    Word Count
    91
    Original Publication
    Date Published
    2017
    Complete Poems
    ---
    Theme(s)
    First Line
    You better grow the
    Poetic Form
    open
    manuscript

    Permission to reproduce work from the James Hearst Papers has been granted by the Special Collections Department of the University of Iowa Libraries.