acceptance speech

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    I’ve got more thoughts running through my head than I can get organized into anything coherent tonight and so I offer this wonderful poem I found today at The Writer’s Almanac. The poet is Lynn Powell.

    Acceptance Speech

    The radio’s replaying last night’s winners
    and the gratitude of the glamorous,
    everyone thanking everybody for making everything
    so possible, until I want to shush
    the faucet, dry my hands, join in right here
    at the cluttered podium of the sink, and thank

    my mother for teaching me the true meaning of okra,
    my children for putting back the growl in hunger,
    my husband, primo uomo of dinner, for not
    begrudging me this starring role—

    without all of them, I know this soup
    would not be here tonight.

    And let me just add that I could not
    have made it without the marrow bone, that blood—
    brother to the broth, and the tomatoes
    who opened up their hearts, and the self-effacing limas,
    the blonde sorority of corn, the cayenne
    and oregano who dashed in
    in the nick of time.

    Special thanks, as always, to the salt—
    you know who you are—and to the knife,
    who revealed the ripe beneath the rind,
    the clean truth underneath the dirty peel.

    —I hope I’ve not forgotten anyone—
    oh, yes, to the celery and the parsnip,
    those bit players only there to swell the scene,
    let me just say: sometimes I know exactly how you feel.

    But not tonight, not when it’s all
    coming to something and the heat is on and
    I’m basking in another round
    of blue applause.

    Peace,
    Milton