CHORE
My friend turns anything into
prayer. Sweeping the leaves, shaving
his beard, washing dishes—
every act a purging
of what doesn’t serve. Today
I’m folding laundry. I start with jeans,
crisp from the dryer, smoothing the creases
then draping them on wooden hangers.
Shaking wrinkles from the sheets, I square
the corners the way Mother taught.
White T-shirts stacked flat on a shelf,
sundresses on felt hangers, sweaters
nestled in drawers. I find a place
for every blouse, every scarf, until
it feels inevitable. Order our days—
the remnant floats up from decades
of Sundays like words of a forgotten
song—in Your peace. My mantra:
fold, hang, repeat, the hamper
half-empty, the bureau warm
with balled-up socks.
“Chore” from What Happens Is Neither © 2021, by Angela Narciso Torres. Appears with permission of Four Way Books. All rights reserved. Buy the book here.
By describing first how her friend can turn any action or so-called chore into a form of prayer, and then showing us the way she does this “today” by folding laundry, Angela Narciso Torres teaches us to do the same. She writes so carefully and lovingly of how she smoothes, folds, stacks and drapes all of her and her family’s clothing that we can’t help but feel a sense of calmness and order emanating from this otherwise simple scene. I often say that the gateway to a mindful poem, which stays with the reader, is a strong set of sensory details, and the sense that most stands out in this is that of touch and texture. Notice how those creased jeans and felt hangers and “sweaters nestled in drawers” all come to physical life in this poem, until we reach those final vivid lines about the bureau now “warm with balled-up socks.” That warmth has transferred not only to the dresser she’s filling with folded clothing, but also to us as we feel those socks fresh from the dryer, each one blessed for a moment by the heat of her attentive touch.
Invitation for Writing & Reflection: How might you bring a sense of the sacred and reverence to the sometimes repetitive tasks that we have to complete each day? Is there some chore that has transformed for you into an act of mindfulness or devotion?
Photo of Angela Narciso Torres from angelanarcisotorres.com
ABOUT THE POET: ANGELA NARCISO TORRES
Angela Narciso Torres is the author of What Happens Is Neither (Four Way Books 2021), Blood Orange, winner of the 2013 Willow Books Literature Award for Poetry, and the chapbook, To the Bone (Sundress Publications 2020). Recent work appears or is forthcoming in POETRY, Missouri Review, Quarterly West, Cortland Review, and Poetry Northwest. A graduate of Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers and Harvard Graduate School of Education, Angela has received fellowships from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Illinois Arts Council, and Ragdale Foundation. She received First Prize in the Yeats Poetry Prize (W.B. Yeats Society of New York). New City magazine named her one of Chicago’s Lit 50: Who Really Books in Chicago. Born in Brooklyn and raised in Manila, she currently resides in San Diego. She serves as a senior and reviews editor for RHINO Poetry.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: JAMES CREWS
James Crews is the author of four collections of poetry: The Book of What Stays, Telling My Father, Bluebird, and Every Waking Moment. He is also the editor of two anthologies: Healing the Divide: Poems of Kindness and Connection and How to Love the World: Poems of Gratitude and Hope. His poems have appeared in Ploughshares, The New Republic, The New York Times Magazine, The Sun, and have been reprinted in Ted Kooser’s American Life in Poetry and featured on Tracy K. Smith’s podcast, The Slowdown. James teaches at SUNY-Albany and lives with his husband in Vermont.
FURTHER EXPLORATION
Thank you for reading. Please enjoy these related works. A portion of all purchases goes to support Gwarlingo.
Thanks to hundreds of readers who have given donations big and small, Gwarlingo remains ad-free. Donors who give $50 become members. If you love Gwarlingo, please consider giving back.
