More from Maya Stein... pass it on

I love how she captured the way I feel about those early morning hours.


the first quiet of the morning

Don't spend it on the stack of mail, the phone call,
the mounting inventory of groceries. Resist
the finished wash cycle and the dishes clamoring for clean-up.
Ignore the pileup by the front door, the mess left in the wake
of the weekend. These things carry the patience and constancy of bedrock.
Not the first quiet of the morning. It is thin and needy, hungry for your touch.
You will miss it when it goes, siphoning out the way it does, toppled
by the weight of all your noisy urgencies, those lists mortaring your day together.
This for you, this sweet and brief emptiness, this desert island, this nest nesting
your inevitable flight. Hold your wings still. Don't go just yet.