Admission is free

“Do you ever feel the only way to be happy is to be someone else?”

^{Where or When by Gertrude Abercrombie}

Dear friends,

Today’s poem is about envy — the quiet kind that sneaks in not when someone wins an award or buys a yacht, but when a tree looks too peaceful or a “man whose shoes look as if they know how to dance.” It so wonderfully captures the strange ache of wanting to be someone else, or maybe something else — something that glows or glides or doesn’t feel so stuck inside its own head. It’s called Admission is free, which is true of jealousy, too. No ticket needed, just a pulse.

Sending this out with a bowl of oranges,

Karan

Admission is free

by Bob Hicok

The clamor of pots and pans 
in my head: I can get jealous 
over anything. A river 
that speaks Spanish. 
Excellent spelling. 
A man whose shoes look 
as if they really know how to dance. 
The way oranges in a bowl 
can own the morning. I once got jealous 
of a tree in fall, how calm it was 
to be the daughter of fire 
and shed the shimmer 
that made it special, 
that made people stop and think, 
There goes one hell of a tree.
Do you ever feel the only way to be happy 
is to be someone else? Well that's 
my life. Banging on the door 
of my face to get out, 
pleading with the wind 
to reach in, grab me like a balloon 
and teach me how to rise 
above myself. It never does, 
just goes on and on 
going on and on, as if 
the one thing it knows for sure
is anywhere I am not 
is the place to be. 

This poem was first published in ONLY POEMS.