They Call It Happiness
Myself, I had no name to give
the millions of mysteries that fell
last spring, those little red-brown
demands to choose—either try to
rake, sweep, hose, blow them off
or let winter return them to earth.
So I asked my friend Nancy. No,
she, herself, and her husband Jim,
himself, did not know what they
were—that shroud spread over
streets, gutters, parked cars, walks,
gardens, homes, everything. We
just call it happiness, she said.
From Old Norse happ—good luck—
unrequested and unexpected came
joy in living. A bumper crop of—
I learned—pollen cones spawned
by pines, cedars, firs so joyful they
buried us in such luck. What were
they thinking? That a forest might
once more rise from city blocks?
But yes, it somehow makes sense.
Nancy—grace or favor—and Jim—
from Hebrew follows after—do not,
themselves, doubt. Why else teach
Sophie—wisdom—a beloved Lab,
to rejoice at fetching towels from a
closed closet one by one, only to be
used, washed, dried, folded, and put
back so, glad to hear her name, she
can each season retrieve them again.
Michael—meaning who is like God?
You, yourself, a question? Why not
happiness, with no better answer?
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Mike Barrett grew up in Montana; studied literature, philosophy, and law at Harvard; and currently lives in Seattle. His poems have appeared in, among other publications, The MacGuffin, The Alembic, Cider Press Review, Plainsongs, Post Road Magazine (Pushcart nominee), Atlanta Review, Passager (honorary mention, 2020 Poetry Contest), and Gray’s Sporting Journal.
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Stone Poetry Quarterly 