Mother
She felt bad for the orphaned zucchinis, she said,
And brought home eight although we only needed two,
Or maybe three,
And when August killed the lettuce but never the squash
Or the zucchinis (six too many),
She made zucchini into every dish zucchini can become:
Chocolate cake, stir fry, lasagna,
Breads and muffins, and even
Zucchini Parmesan.
And when she ran out of recipes,
She gave away those zucchinis like the world had been left to starve.
She gave them away in baskets, in bags, in breads,
In anonymous donations to the church’s produce table,
Left it on doorsteps like an abandoned kitten that
She couldn’t take care of but didn’t want to die.
And when all the neighbors were fed and happy but
The zucchinis kept producing faster than she could pick,
She played baseball with those zucchinis in the neighbor’s field,
Sowing seeds for the year to come.
Wrist
1.
A guilty, bloody surge between my thighs and the
Telltale pink of unexpected, pubescent lust:
The first time I watched (really watched) a man
Drive stick shift, somewhere on a road in Tennessee,
The tendons in his forearm taunt between skin too hairy,
And the bones of his wrist suddenly too visible as he shifted,
So smoothly,
Into 5th.
2.
Circled fingers around my mother’s wrists
With room between thumb and index
And her skin.
I never bought her bracelets.
3.
Hard hands can be handcuffs, too,
When they’re clasped around the wrist and
Won’t let go.
You cannot hold
When someone holds you there:
Glasses fall from hand, words, wallet, dignity, time.
You cannot clap,
Cannot wave a hand in greeting,
(Or raise it in defense),
Cannot caress away the shudders of shoulder, sobbing.
Give me back my wrists and
Let me be.
4.
Such thin skin.
Prime for kisses, love.
