A katydid chirped
somewhere in this
200 year-old cottage,
interrupting the nightly
rituals, the scramble to
finish everything on the
proverbial fifteen year-old plate.
A lightning rod for all teenaged
concerns diverted anxiety onto
one undeserving creature
that has but one year to live
himself.
She is less entomophobic, more
stuck in the middle of
push and pull, making the
daily decision to provide, need, or
want, to place her hands on the
end of the rope that is manned by the
appropriate team.
This time, her younger self wins:
not the one who complains about
the sensitivity of her navel,
the grimace of the ancient place
that once connected her to her host; or
feels annoyance by
the dichotomy of responsibilities
of the child/parent who diverts trips home
through her ancestral village
to flip switches that her own
octogenarian mother can’t reach,
But the one who revels in the
foregone conclusion that
her mother will always want
to cradle her in the palms of
her warm hands, the same ones
that transport a green grasshopper
to a more obliging, al fresco
surrounding.
Sleep comes, tucked into
a familiar fetal position,
at the end of the day when she reflects
on all that has become ours, the
lists, the burden of what she carried, but ultimately,
Under the pacific weight of a quilt that allows
rest, respite, and a feral understanding
of the comfort it is to live where we belong and
to be essential, at both ends of the rope.