The Wardrobe's Best Dressed: Sandy Gingras' "Not Even Close to What She Planned On"

What she wished for

A man fell out of the sky.
He hit at her feet like an issue resolved.
There was no returning him,
that much was clear,
although everything else about him
was hazy—as if she really didn’t
think him through.

He was like a summer day—sunny
and warm, which was maybe
what she was wishing for
more than the man himself.
It was actually more of a whim
than a wish, she told him.
He understood what she meant.

She had always believed that
she was a complicated person,
that she wanted too much.
But no. Here he was as plain as day.
A bird came to rest on his shoulder.

He told her that he wanted
to make her happy. He said
he would always be there for her.
The bird started to sing a song.

She looked up at the empty sky.
The bird thing was really starting
to get to her. The truth is,
I don’t deserve you, she said.
But the man was a little deaf,
and the bird started to build a nest
on his head.

This selection comes from the poetry chapbook “Not Even Close to What She Planned On” by Sandy Gingras, which is available to purchase here from Diode Editions.

Sandy Gingras is the author and illustrator of twenty-five illustrated books. She also wrote a mystery novel, SWAMPED, which won the Crime Writers Association’s Debut Dagger Award in 2012. Her poetry and memoir pieces have been published in many journals. She designs stationery and gift products for several companies and owns two retail stores. She lives with her husband, son and Golden Retriever on an island six miles out to sea off the coast of New Jersey.

Jennie Frost is a Jewish, Appalachian poet from Maryville, TN. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Anomaly, Kudzu, Glass Mountain, Sink Hollow, Indicia, Mochila, Stirring, and Political Punch, an anthology on the politics of identity from Sundress Publications. She is a three-time winner of the Curtis Owens prize and beginning in January, she will serve as the Writer in Residence at the Sundress Academy for the Arts.