In this week’s poem, poet Abbie Kiefer extols the small, the modest and the low-key. I love the range of marvelously minor phenomena that earn her celebration and the reverent ritual repetition of her invitation to “praise” each of them.

Kiefer grew up in Maine and now lives in New Hampshire. She is the author of “Certain Shelter” (June Road Press, 2024), and her work as appeared in Copper Nickel, Ploughshares, The Southern Review and other places.

In Praise of Minor

poets, faithful to work that will meet
with quiet. In praise of minor deities
and whoever dreamed them up. Made
Ariadne the goddess of passion
and also mazes. Circuity and doubling
back. In praise of college minors:
Brewing. Cinema. Latin, though long
dead. Praise Canis Minor, steadfast, forever
the lesser dog. Praise minor chords
that have consonance. A sadness
that resolves. Let’s praise minor
inconveniences. The onions quick-
slipped from a sandwich, set down
on a sweetheart’s waiting plate.
In the kitchen they made the line cook cry.
Praise minor tributaries,
all that sliding water giving itself
to another. In this minor league park,
praise the runner, breaking for home
on a sacrifice fly. He doesn’t
make it. Praise the runner.
When the phone trembles
his pocket, for a beat it’s always Boston.
We need you. Come now.
September, and there’s cold coming
in from Casco Bay. The sky is burdening;
they’re tarping the field. Still, we could stay.
Maybe minor weather. Showers passing by.

— Abbie Kiefer