Have a Good Idea.

At work there are certain things I always say.

Sometimes I think of it as a sort of chant.

“Blah blah price today. Thank you. Here you go.”

It’s a chorus of numbers and repeated phrases,

A ballet of credit cards and coffee cups.

Corporate choreography through a sliding glass window,

Thrust horizontally apart then back together.

Once the dancers have descended

It is time for the last line of the opera

And I am the fat lady who bids them good day

In a sing-songy voice.

But today is not the same.

My diction derails somewhere between

Mind and body, takes a course of its own

and comes out:

“Have a good idea!”

I didn’t mean to say it but I decide to mean it-

This appeal for innovation by the slip of a tongue.

And so I say again to you,

Have a good idea.

Hold onto it like the last word you read

Before you looked up from your book;

The word you’ll return to when you’re

Trying to find your place.

Have a good idea

And then turn it into something else.

Plant it and grow it and pluck it and use it.

Refuse to let it die.

Have a good idea

To do something about your life.

To help someone else’s.

To change anything as long as it’s for the better.

And if you can’t think of anything, at least

Have the good idea to have a good day.