There was a hum of fretwork guess-
work a piecework of selves on the veranda where I asked
my mother how much did it cost to carry so many filaments
two instead of one when smocked and behooved
we left the hospital each with a different
kind of insomnia–––––a different kind
of question and a
different kind of mother torn under a glistening
yolk of sun
that put everything on the table whether
we wished it or not
In the late summer a kind of lull sulked around
the house not deliberately but everybody unconsciously
slowed their blood assumed the right position even visitors
––––––children knew to play outdoors while adults
continued to plait bread and vacuum
When mulberries finished flexing their purplish seeds
a more ancient time arrived and out of silence I remember
climbing through a wall of thorny scrub
to find a tree in a clearing
swathed in bees and at the heart a black sun into which all
bees traveled Here I put my sibling
and my mother’s caul of tears into a pollen pot that swayed
in step with the wind It was no altar
but a cup of gold-dusted slumber that stung and over-
swarmed with a dissident task–––––irrational
plentiful
bristling with relief–––––stoic as moon-
light unearthing the ash of sleep.
