Photo Credit: Michael Graydon
Used With Photographer's Permission
Wooden Spoons
Every spoon's got a handle,
contains what's tasted and fed.
One scoops and folds, cuts
deep into butter it batters then
creams. Another dips lightly
and stirs, taking clean turns
'round lipped edges of measuring
bowls. Rolled on rounded back,
black walnut lies close in a box
where chestnut makes a cozy nest
for teak, and old maple flashes
morning's beeswax salve. Carved
to show the beauty of the imperfect
grain, each fits the shape of what
my own hand balances and retains.
© 2012 Maureen E. Doallas
When I was a girl, Inhad a neighbor who would make wooden utensils in his garage. He once gave me a wooden spoon...now I'm wondering if I have it somewhere in my mother's old wooden spoons. Delightful poem that sparked fond memories.
ReplyDeleteAnd one can play them, to create that homespun sound of the kitchen taking flight! Lovely images of so much that's ordinary and too often taken for granted. This reminds me of how much we conform the world to needs and desires. Should I also mention Heidegger's notions of ready-to-hand and present-to-hand? Such attitudes towards life and its utensils.
ReplyDeletethere's a certain magic in wooden spoons...great images maureen
ReplyDeleteWhat a great way of taking something so ordinary, so everyday and using it metaphorically to highlight difference and value....for me I took your poem to refer to people- we all come in different shapes and sizes - but all have our differences and different talents...very thoughtful and well formed poem....v much enjoyed!
ReplyDeletesmiles....nice...mom used wooden spoons all the time...we have a few sitting in the utensil holder...mostly for cookie making...i like the simplicity of them...
ReplyDeleteMaureen, I love the personality of each wooden gem here! Well written!
ReplyDeleteGreat poem. Reminds me of how Neruda would make poems about simple objecs.
ReplyDeleteBeautifully hollowed out, burnished, praised and sung: a spoon song. xxxj
ReplyDeleteMy best friends mother used to call the wooden spoon the board of education... Very nice images and serenity through the process... lovely poem.
ReplyDeleteMaureen, tanks for the continued education in poetry. Ekphrastic! Even the term itself gets me excited to try one.
ReplyDeleteThanks, too, for the prayers last week.
I love the explication at the end. It's perfect:
ReplyDelete"to show the beauty of the imperfect
grain, each fits the shape of what
my own hand balances and retains."
I especially love "cuts deep into butter it batters then creams." I, too, mostly use wooden spoons for baking.
ReplyDeleteCharles, I just heard Keith Terry, a body musician, play the spoons!
In the Florida Keys there's a great breakfast/lunch place called the wooden spoon. They have wooden spoons on the wall and they make great french toast. :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for the poem and its contemplation of wooden spoons.
ReplyDeleteI imagine there is a whole history of planetary environmental decline in those spoons, too. All the hardwoods gone and no longer available for such purposes, all the wooden spoons now softer woods, less durable.
As a batter eater, though, I have licked more than my share...
Thanks for the evocative read!
The rolling of spoons, the feel of them in your hand and the description of the distinctive woods bedded in a box ... All nicely done.
ReplyDeleteI like poems that use simple objects to take us somewhere else. Wooden spoons are simple enough looking, but carry deeply textured meanings reaching far down into our lives, and in this case, serve as a kind of measure of our lives. This poem is an excellent example of something you do very well.
ReplyDeleteOh goodness...I just re-read my comment. Could I possibly have said "wooden" and "spoons" more often in a response? Yeesh, and a typo too. Oh well, suffice to say that I enjoyed your poem very much!
ReplyDelete