At The Motel Poem by Ronald Baatz

AT THE MOTEL

The first task in the morning
is often the shoveling of snow.
And, under another drab gray sky,
shoveling snow is exactly what
I'm doing. I shovel in front of the
office and then by the row of rooms.
Lucky for me this snowfall is not
a weighty one. But I shouldn't complain
even if the work is hard. It's all
part of the job and I know how lucky I am
to have a place to live these first years
after divorce. I'm too inept at finding
a job and I can't afford to move away,
so there really is no sense in complaining
about having to shovel snow or performing
any number of other tasks connected with
living in this situation. Besides, it won't be
long before time reshuffles the deck and
I'll end up somewhere else doing something
else to survive, and I'll be looking back with
fondness to the time in my life, when every
room had a number on its door and every
number was screwed in tightly.

Woodstock/1987