Kitchen Table Politics

To properly prepare a ballot

First leave it sitting for a week or two on the kitchen table

Let it marinate in the half-awake putter between mug, teabag and kettle

Soak in the early evening rush to feed child, partner, dog, get homework done and make one more call

It should be lightly floured

Stained heart-beat red with the ketchup that splatters as you squeeze out the last few drops

Seared by the hot pan just off the stove with nowhere to go but on the unkempt pile of mail

It should be marked by the watery circle of one more cup no one remembered to put in the dishwasher

It should have a grocery list quickly scrawled across the cover

and quick math for a tight budget balanced on the back

Oh god

let the truth of our messy kitchen lives

be cast into the ballot box

Let the uncertainties and fears and anxieties of our intimate hearths

be heard at last in our public cries

Or if that’s too much to ask

Remind all who lead

All who decide and debate and determine in our fragile democracy

That they too must sometimes borrow eggs from a neighbor

Fish shells out of the bowl

Bake imperfect bread

Send our kitchens with our votes,

oh god,

or bring our politics back to the cutting board.