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This poem by Somerville Bagel Bard Wendell Smith is a response to Somerville poet Bert Stern’s poetry collection, What I got for a Dollar.

Change for a Dollar
after Bert Stern

Following Bert’s instruction
I notice the sunlight
leaking through the Maples
in my neighbor’s yard,

and find I’m unprepared
it takes me three trips
from patio to the kitchen
for a beer and pencil

A few sips and a slug later
I forget what I was going to say
to hold onto the leak while
the afternoon oozes into relaxation.

It’s so simple if you let it be
although hops are bitter in beer
they are refreshing.
The news is bitter too

that bitter news can wait
forever ‘til tomorrow, right?
now I have a new leak that
needs all of my attention

What Bert got for a dollar
tells me not to be bashful
nor try to be cool but be joyful
and attend to my leak.

Embrace being hot
and call it all beautiful
let the breeze be cool
that’s what the breeze is for.

— Wendell Smith

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