little things

Little Things 

Little things in my coat pocket. detached purple button from the Union Square farmer's market where it popped off. How I wanted to buy flowers but couldn't. They will wilt on the train, lose their remarkable ballet necks, shed petals underfoot.

Some little things make me nervous.  I can't swallow sometimes. Driving alone on a road with no shoulder. Crying babies, long awkward silences at dinner parties when everyone looks at me for help.

Little things, such quick happiness, like flickering rainbows gone before you can call someone to say you saw a rainbow. How it lit up the sky and no one saw it except you and some guy at the softball field who barely cared. 

A little foolish thing: a blouse from Anthropologie that costs $128.  If I buy this blouse I will look so thin, so put together. Everything will fall into place like fingers flying through stacks of paper.

A stone is a little thing. Everyone knows women who fill up glass jars with shells and things. They seem to say, "I'm putting a stone in here, for no reason, just because it's so lovely and quirky." If only it was that easy, a stone in a jar.