Trying to Decide on a New occupation

Jim Zola

House light wells around weary furnishings.
The weatherman predicts thundersnow.
All day I read books about plumbing,

letting the names of tools refit my tongue —
spud wrench, pex crimpers. I waste hours
looking out windows as birds switch

from oak to elm to someplace else.
We all make choices. I choose to resist
the heartfelt, the heart, the plunger, the auger.

Jim Zola has worked in a warehouse, as a security guard, in a bookstore, as a teacher for Deaf children, as a toy designer for Fisher Price, and currently as a children's librarian. Published in many journals through the years, his publications include a chapbook — The One Hundred Bones of Weather (Blue Pitcher Press) — and a full length poetry collection — What Glorious Possibilities (Aldrich Press). He currently lives in Greensboro, NC