Young Writers Society

------for i have taken refuge in you

What can be said in only three short walls.
The soft harnesses of mother and the broadsides
which read, ‘house of order, a house unto—’
Under ‘occupation’ she puts homemaker,
having scraped it from the sides of a barrel
on shot knees, building heat like lashes
of raft. After the pretty shellac houses
in Brookings she was never quite the same—
homes disgracing drift, set by beaches
like blanket luncheons of nails, gable,
cream trim. She puts cradler, bearer-up
of supine gangs. Our coolant of finally
having gotten her attention, and lagging
in the last of it. Allergies? Primary Care
Provider? The hearts of the children
are turned to their fathers. She would cut
through thick pastures of hair, show us
the failing of wing to wing, and how dream
subsides to room. We were wallet-sized,
dug in to advent calendars, raided selvage space,
sedged through the oil for lower lugs of milk. Homes
which meant nothing, had no function, unlike
the ingenious defile of wings. She puts crooner, admits
two packs a day, and a shaky heart history.
She puts up, shacks up, explains to me what
a flying buttress is, a resistance to lateral falling
wall-forces. I meet her in the juncture
between hall and sleep, hunkered under
her chin and droop. She goes into negotiations
for a futon, a night stand, a petty loan,
puts down a list of ongoing conditions,
feeding problems, first day of last normal
menstrual period, history of, how long? Breast
fed: Y N_____How long: __________