Perfection (In a Nutshell) (Thinking of Maurice Sendak)
There once was a little girl who had a grandmother who believed in perfection.
There were good things about having a grandmother who believed in perfection. One was a small diamond birthday tiara–it must have been diamond, it shined so bright–with little comb teeth that the grandmother anchored into the girl’s hair just before that magical moment when she brought out the equally glowing cake she had made, its candles flaming as high as the diamond peaks–
And once the grandmother made a clover crown for the little girl when they sat out in the backyard, which was itself magical, for this was not a grandmother who sat in grass much, and this was not your ordinary clover crown–a row of single flowers knotted from spindly stem to blossom–but was woven out of thick bands of flowers, somehow interlocked–
But this grandmother, who knew so very much about crowns, also wanted things neat and straight and right now and once she went into the little girl’s room, and there was one toy on the floor, she told her that it looked like a hurricane had passed through.
And you could never hang wet laundry out on the Grandmother’s line on anything but a Monday.
And beware of cracker crumbs.
And the little girl had to smile nicely and always in clean clothes, knees as closed as a mouth was supposed to be when eating.
Then one day the grandmother gave the girl a little box of littler books; and each book opened to its own separate story about a boy who looked as if he should be named Max, but was sometimes called Johnny or Pierre. The boy had a slightly devilish but also sometimes worried or sad or bored or haughty or gleeful face–and drank soup while ice-skating and involved himself with alligators and had a knowing white-haired dog, but, most importantly of all, frowned.
And, while frowning, he repeatedly told his parents – who looked concerned (but rather helpless)–that he didn’t care. Not that he was pouring syrup on his hair, or sitting backward in his chair, or was here or there, or….anything.
Not only did the boy tell his parents he didn’t care – he also told a lion. Who then ate him briefly.
This was all very interesting to the girl.
And, when her grandmother laughed at the drawn frowning boy–laughed so hard that she slipped slightly in her own chair—it became even more interesting to the girl. Who noticed that somewhere on these pages was a little gold crown.
That looked
as if it had been made
of paper.
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I wrote the above prose poem for a
dVerse Poets Pub Poetics prompt hosted by
Brian Miller and Aaron Kent on the topic of the incomparable Maurice Sendak.
If you are interested in children’s books, I urge you to check out my modest (but fun) offerings: a picture book called
1 Mississippi (children’s counting book with elephants, illustrated by yours truly) and
Nose Dive, a really fun young adult novel with absolutely terrific and somewhat Sendakian illustrations by Jonathan Segal.
ManicDDaily 
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