I’m continuing my celebration of National Poetry Month by posting a poem here each week. My sonnet “Cleaning out the Exhaust Vent” won a local poetry contest and was subsequently published in the winners’ anthology Versifico. For a while it was available on the library’s blog, but since it’s gone inactive there I’m reprinting it here.
It’s fitting because my dad’s birthday is in April, and I’m always thinking about him this time of year. One of the things I carry in my memory is his scent, a mixture of things—one of which was baby powder. He used baby powder like it was going out of style. We used to tease him about it. He’d sprinkle it on after a shower, so his bathroom was always just layered with it. After he died, my brother and I sorted through his things and cleaned up the house to sell. When we got to the dust-caked exhaust fan in the bathroom ceiling, this is what happened.
Cleaning out the Exhaust Vent
We didn’t know if we should laugh or cry
when baby powder fell instead of dust—
sifted like the softest snow from the sky
and floated through the room to blanket us
in memories and smells just scarcely dead
of how, for him, the powder was a must.
You lowered the canned air from overhead
to cough out puffs of white—and I did too—
then ruffled your hair, looked at me and said
“It’s baby powder,” and almost on cue
a salty, misty film filled up our eyes
like goggles, even as our smiles grew,
and through all of the heartache and surprise,
we didn’t know if we should laugh or cry.
© Annie Neugebauer, 2016
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