“breathing up sunrise”

This quote from Martin Shaw

We need stories – sometimes subtle, gentle things – that restore in us a sense of goodness. Not just jagged bitterness frothing at the mouth or bonkers political hijacking of deep religious themes.

… goes well with Mekeel McBride’s poem “A Little Bit of Timely Advice”:

A Little Bit of Timely Advice

Time you put on blue
shoes, high-heeled, sequined,
took yourself out dancing.

You been spending too much
time crying salty
dead-fish lakes into soupspoons,

holding look-alike contests
with doom. Baby, you
need to be moving. Ruin

ruins itself, no use unplanting
what’s left of your garden.
Crank up the old radio

into lion-looking-for-food
music; or harmonica, all indigo,
breathing up sunrise. Down

and out’s just another opinion
on up and over. You say
you got no makings

for a song? Sing anyway.
Best music’s the stuff comes
rising out of nothing.