The Roommate
It’s early morning (morning prayer): I hear
Her in her room as now and then she sighs
Or groans or mutters out a word or two
(Quite indecipherable but flush with fear).
At first disturbing, now it’s no surprise,
A morning sound (as outside pigeons coo…).
I say a prayer that God might give her hope.
(She’ll soon be up and read her horoscope…).
Jeffrey Essmann is an essayist and poet living in New York. His poetry has appeared in numerous magazines and literary journals, among them Agape Review, America Magazine, Dappled Things, the St. Austin Review, U.S. Catholic, Grand Little Things, Heart of Flesh Literary Journal, and various venues of the Benedictine monastery with which he is an oblate. He is editor of the Catholic Poetry Room page on the Integrated Catholic Life website.
Thank you, Jeffrey, for this touching and intriguing poem. The compassion is tangible and makes me want to understand more about the inaccessible female subject. Best wishes, Bruce
I loved this poem, Jeffrey. It’s challenging enough to cope with a coworker’s quirky thoughts, but enduring a roommate’s eccentricities is a higher hurdle. The speaker’s Christian patience is an inspiration.
Yes, intriguing is the word. For me, Jeffrey, it’s what you don’t tell the reader that makes this poem so absorbing. Its brevity emphasises its enigmatic quality: if you had answered the questions it leaves unanswered, I think, paradoxically, that I’d find the piece less interesting. An enjoyable vignette – thank you.
Good surprise ending word, Jeffrey. It flashes into an unresolved contrast between God-given individual hope and the habit of consulting a pre-published one-size-fits-most horoscope. The speaker’s prayer seems like the midway human response to a companion “flush with fears” every morning. The pigeon’s coo (a contented sound) would represent creation unaware of the human unconscious. Your eight lines observe much.
I get a feeling of a roommate who is unable to take control of her life, hence the horoscope.
As mentioned above, what is not said brings this poem intriguingly together.
Thanks for the read, Jeffrey.
This poem is an extremely condensed version of all the natural wisdom that matters. All that’s said (or unsaid) creates a perfect autonomous entity that speaks for itself — in other words, a perfect poem.