admission is free

a poem by Bob Hicok

October 9, 2024

Admission is free

The clamor of pots and pans 
in my head: I can get jealous 
over anything. A river 
that speaks Spanish. 
Excellent spelling. 
A man whose shoes look 
as if they really know how to dance. 
The way oranges in a bowl 
can own the morning. I once got jealous 
of a tree in fall, how calm it was 
to be the daughter of fire 
and shed the shimmer 
that made it special, 
that made people stop and think, 
There goes one hell of a tree. 
Do you ever feel the only way to be happy 
is to be someone else? Well that's 
my life. Banging on the door 
of my face to get out, 
pleading with the wind 
to reach in, grab me like a balloon 
and teach me how to rise 
above myself. It never does, 
just goes on and on 
going on and on, as if 
the one thing it knows for sure
is anywhere I am not 
is the place to be. 

Headshot of poet Bob Hicok.

Bob Hicok is the author of Water Look Away (Copper Canyon Press, 2023). He has received a Guggenheim, two NEA Fellowships, the Bobbitt Prize from the Library of Congress, nine Pushcart Prizes, and was twice a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. His poems have appeared in nine volumes of the Best American Poetry.