I Love Faith Shearin

The Writer’s Almanac for Sunday, March 8, 2020


The Meaning of Clean
by Faith Shearin

I have been looking for the meaning of clean.
Money is dirty but wealthy people are clean.
Women are dirty but men are clean.

Door handles are never clean because
they have been touched a million times
by hands. Virgins and nuns are clean.

Mountain air is clean. Babies are clean.
Clean people are better than dirty people.
Clean things sparkle; they are spotless,

unsullied, unstained. Untidy people are lazy.
If you clean a tub or an oven you must
get down on your hands and knees

as if you are praying. Love is clean
but desire is dirty. Surgery requires
a sterile field. If you have not been arrested

your record is clean. Stars are clean
and night is clean and cold. Swearing
is dirty and flies are dirty and mice

are so dirty they brought plagues
on their backs. In a neighborhood
the tidy have the right to dislike the untidy.

Dust gathers like disapproval. If you
have quit a drink or a drug you are dean.
Sin is unclean but baptism is cleansing.

Your parents may ask you to dean your room.
Janitors and maids make very little money
because anyone can clean but nobody

wants to. Most houses are cleaned
by women though they themselves
are unclean. If you don’t wash

your hands you may catch an infection.



“The Meaning of Clean” by Faith Shearin from Moving the Piano. Stephen F. Austin University Press © 2011