Seeing in the Dark
She likes to go out at night, my mother,
and walk the daylily border, housed
in the darkness which makes the body’s presence seem
like it could be a lie–
like only some movement, and its accompanying sound,
could stand for what is there, or not. Something
comforts her there in the dark, the night sounds
which are not so human. She likes to go out in the darkness
and make soft sounds, her slip-on Keds kneading
the gravel, that bone at the edge of her big toe wearing
an impression into the cotton, an impression
that will become a hole, threaded
at the edges, neat, a basin for the pad of my finger,
a scope for viewing tiny things, or vast
things from a tiny place, a magnifying glass for my ear
to pick up the swish of her jeans rubbing together, the rustle of
her hand in the tobacco pouch, soft crumple of the rolling papers,
swift lick of the sticky line that seals the cigarette shut, her
face like a bonfire in the brief light of flame.
published in The Northern Virginia Review, Volume 35: Spring 2022