—after The Lounge Lizard’s Queen of All Ears
Relationship: Mother
working beyond a timesheet’s calculating
allowance; working
replicated, say, by the smothering hold
of a squirrel’s amassing future meals, she
alive beyond feminine likings
conjoined by clothespins and
various scents worn atop chattering wrists or
swan-curl neck attracting multiple
survivors. Heard, she hears
crying and laughter within delineated symptoms;
gathers into her hold either proclamation,
understanding emotion writes miracles of need
into the psyche of her innate capabilities.
