All they asked were reasonable rates and went carefully, carefully with the plates.
Yelp review of Poetry Moving Company
If you read Victor a poem or pass his history quiz,
he’ll give a discount on your moving.
Victor moves anything and misses nothing:
pianos, wood stoves, sofas,
but he can’t help you decide
whether to take sorrow or leave it behind.
She packs half their set
of blue peony porcelain plates,
her clothes except those she gave away,
and not the dress she wore that night—
she takes her sofa but not the chair,
her quilts but not the bed —
the bed where—
her poetry books,
but not his novels.
Even with what she has left,
so much is not now,
Victor and his movers don’t take her sorrow,
She takes that in her car with the cats—
their flat is half empty now.
Down Atherton Street moves Victor’s van,
full of what she’s kept,
towards Beacon Street,
where they turn south towards Hyde Park,
they’ll have it all unpacked before supper.
George Longenecker lives in Pennsylvania with his wife and muse, Cynthia Martin, and their dog Aiko. His poems, stories and book reviews have been published in Caesura, Evening Street Review, Rain Taxi, Asimov’s Science Fiction, Best Short Stories from the Saturday Evening Post Great American Fiction Contest and The Mountain Troubadour.
