How Contentment Comes by Deirdre Fagan

In the quiet of a Sunday morning when with covers over my head the children play quietly while I sleep until ten. I wake completely before joining them, making myself a double espresso bedside before journeying to their needs. Upon making breakfast, a poem surprise discovered in yesterday’s pile of mail greets, and reading quietly to myself, my mind awakens to words and to thoughts rising to the unsoiled newness of late sun and of day sounds like bacon and laughter. I have not yet had to do anything in these early moments that I did not want to do, and there was no suffering in any of it. I may be able to ride on these brevities all of my life.

Deirdre Fagan is a widow, newlywed, and mother of two who has published poetry, fiction, and nonfiction in Connotation Press, Eunoia Review, Ink Sweat & Tears, Mothers Always Write, Words Apart, and Yellow Chair Review, among others. She teaches literature and writing at Ferris State University. Meet her at deirdrefagan.com