Sharon Klander
This is a live blogging of the session.
“Souvenirs”
great-grandmother
to cheat bedtime
choreographed to make hurls seem real
metaphor machines on the rope
held to one corner of the velvet divan
pushed flat for me
stuff its deep division with a quilt
3 generations later the coliseum is jammed with television
We called it a motor court
connected like Legos
half-moons of Augustine grass
a doll’s lawn
foot-wide rectangles
there’re no more guests, no register—only a sign
on the office counter: CLOSED. But people live here.
post-war developer believed home is what
you can’t leave
She takes her chair inside.
My mother called, wants to be here, wants me to share
nursing…
too weak to fill me, too thin
bottle, I slept, sated
while my mother paced with too full watery liquid
unswaddling-clothes
I relax because she doesn’t wince
she touches me
baby-gummed biscuit
This last poem, called “Sustenance,” is scheduled to be published in Inkwell magazine as a Notable Finalist.