Sad Poets Society № 10

Finding beauty beneath the surface with Maggie Smith

Photo by Emily Vance on Unsplash

Welcome to this month’s meeting of the Sad Poets Society. Today, we’ll be discussing “Good Bones” by Maggie Smith. Let’s get into it.

Good Bones

BY MAGGIE SMITH

Life is short, though I keep this from my children.
Life is short, and I’ve shortened mine
in a thousand delicious, ill-advised ways,
a thousand deliciously ill-advised ways
I’ll keep from my children. The world is at least
fifty percent terrible, and that’s a conservative
estimate, though I keep this from my children.
For every bird there is a stone thrown at a bird.
For every loved child, a child broken, bagged,
sunk in a lake. Life is short and the world
is at least half terrible, and for every kind
stranger, there is one who would break you,
though I keep this from my children. I am trying
to sell them the world. Any decent realtor,
walking you through a real shithole, chirps on
about good bones: This place could be beautiful,
right? You could make this place beautiful.

Without good bones, everything collapses. Muscles fall limp. Skin sags. Softness is essential to humanity, but so too is strength. Beauty is so arresting because it stands in contrast to—and sometimes grows out of—ugliness and pain.