Wednesday, February 28, 2007

This is an extreme rewrite of something I posted a while ago:

In Stitches

the hum click slower and faster
of the sewing machine, the needle a big fish
feeding from the bottom
of my mother’s hand, the tiny light
like a glass eye hovering over her
fingers

my mother unfolds the transparent
human-colored paper, slides off my shirt
so she can wrap the paper around me
mark space with a pencil

I hold my breath
the hair on my arms
rising
her hands on me

the woman who tucks herself smaller
than the hidden kittens
invisible when I call

my skin as sensitive as the gap
of a missing tooth
if I move my eyes or sigh
she’ll remember I‘m here

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

"my skin as sensitive as the gap
of a missing tooth"

thank you for sending this one to Brim, and I , especially liked that line. the gap, the missing, the tooth, that's the gap missing, troped by its own aloneness/? a solitude of solidarity? in any case, I t hank you.

Christine E. Hamm, Poet Professor Painter said...

Thanks so much, Cliff. That means a lot to me.