Catalog

by Barbara Crooker

It’s February, and we’re freezing, despite global climate change,
despite the melting ice caps. It seems that winter comes later now,
that the seasons are askew. But here in the pages of my L. L. Bean
Catalog, a fire is blazing brightly, natural resin fatwood sticks
bringing it to life, and a mallard blue hearth rug protects my floors.
Warmth is guaranteed no matter what the winter brings: a blizzard
of bad news from the television, the icy rain of losses—age chipping
away at the body, a flurry of Christmas cards where sorrow
tipped the scale away from joy. The radio hisses
its static: another car bomb explodes in Iraq like the rat-

tat-tat of sleet; predictable as a cold front marching
down from Canada. But in these glossy pages, we are told
that when you select your outerwear, you should consider
your personal response to cold, your activity levels,
local weather conditions. Locally, I’d say the weather
is conservative, with a touch of paranoia. Our ears,
whether covered by a Mountain Guide Hat in Moss Khaki
or a Stone Blue Fleece Headband, seem closed to the larger
world, deaf to the voices of want and need. We give
what we can, but not so much it hurts. Somewhere in the city,
a man sleeps in a cardboard box. A woman and a child huddle
under a blanket on a subway grate. We pass by quickly,
wrapped in goosedown and Gore-Tex. The wind keeps
on blowing, as it always will.

—first published in Poetz

Marilyn Banner Oh Barb, this is so so good. And tinged with pain. I love those catalogs and have a similar kind of queasy response - like something is missing - as it is in all our comfortable lives.

Nov 14 at 1:15pm