I Used to Eat a Little Box of Candy Daily
Special People Who Wake Us Up
Each person we meet in life is special in some way, not just within themselves but also within us as well. The simple complex needs of daily life do not allow us time to think about, much less to pray over, each one of these special people, or devote to them even half the close and casual attention they deserve.
But every now and then someone unique to us arrives from out of nowhere, so it seems, and catches our attention, wakes us up, makes us happy, and makes us look again to see what we have been missing in life.
We must, of course, keep such happy moments under close surveillance and control, for we know, or we should know by now, that life is long as well as short, and we must live our entire lifetimes rich with the memories, both good and bad, of every exhilarating mistake we indulged, long after it has packed its bags and moved along to fascinate and torment someone else.
This little attempt at a poem was inspired by one such recent encounter that had some unique aspects and alerted me to the universality of the situation. I hope you like it.
I Used to Eat a Little Box of Candy Daily
I used to eat a little box of candy daily
until my dentist said it ate enamel freely,
but when I learned to take my treasured sweets discretely,
the urgency of dental work declined completely.
When I was young, my mother liked to call me “Maxie,”
but when I had grown up, she stopped de-lib-er-ate-ly,
and this let me become the “Max” I wanted to be,
but other people came to see they rarely did see.
A thousand charismatic charmers have impressed me,
but my existence hasn't always made them happy.
In spite of firmly thinking that our choices are free,
our preconceptions make productive match unlikely.
My latest charmer has presumed to call me “Maxi,”
and even made me sit up straight spec-tac-u-lar-ly.
She acts as if she doesn’t care par-tic-u-lar-ly,
a little social game that people play routinely.
But often, when we win that game, we end up losing,
and sometimes when we lose that game, we end up winning.
What starts out sweet and smart soon has our heads a-spinning,
and win or lose, we're apt to whine, “What was I thinking?!”
Each roommate brings a special trunkful of logistics
to charm and complicate our personal statistics.
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Copyright © July 2011 by Max J. Havlick, Writers Workshop, The Max Havlick School of Personal Creation and World Citizenship, a project of New World Community Enterprises, Inc., 16 W. Vermont St., Villa Park, Illinois 60181-1938, all rights reserved (30 min. from O’Hare Airport). Permission granted to make exact copies that include the opening statement, the poem, and this copyright notice.
