Today's poem is The Widow Learns To Cook by Weslea Sidon. It is read by Samaa Abdurraqib.
The Widow Learns To Cook
On the radio I hear
a conversation about broken hearts
—that they are real
and mine might well be fragile
and in danger.
Listening to a doctor on the radio,
in my kitchen relearning how to cook,
learning that my heart break
might leave my heart less able, less willing
to carry me through all the things
I now must learn,
is riveting.
I clutch my heart,
or where I think my heart must be,
and beg: stop if you must, but please
don't do it now, before this one thing
that smells good in this lonely, too clean
kitchen, is ready.