Young women are seated
in the town plaza
a living museum
patient fingers tatting white thread
into soft constellations of stars, flowers, spiderwebs,
tropical snowflakes, or the radial symmetry
of sea creatures waving sinuous tentacles.
The soundless women smile
when I tell them that my mother
was born in this town
and grew up making lace
a required subject for girls
in a school where certain days
were set aside for the silent reading
of saints' lives
or the silent weaving
of intricate, radially symmetric worlds.
Demeter's Dream
Atop the mountain
others yearned for nothing more imaginative
than ambrosia and incest.
She was the only one who longed to descend
and dwell forever among the weary
in love with moist soil
farming the earth
filling all hungers
with wheat
each grain
a possibility
uniting the ache of human limbs
with the trill of winged beings in flight.
She came to the lowlands
and stayed
not only for herself and the hungry
but to bring the birds close
as they swooped down to glean golden fields
while startled humans watched
discovering their own secret longings
for heights
and wings.
Author Bio