coffee: saving a trip,

Coffee:

saving a trip,

I make up my mind to haul

a basket of folded clothes

on my left hip.  Because its

wicker, the basket (and

sometimes by the slip

and virtue of it, my

hip) it’s slick

enough to need that

particular hinge mothers

grow defacto with children

who sit there

while the world is being

made by the women

who bore them.  Broken

on one end, the braiding

in this basket is coming

loose, but who am I

to consider anything else

but letting it fall apart

naturally, so for nearly

fifteen years I’ve lifted sh-

ifted snipped twisted  

thrifty, trip after tip,

up these two flights

of stairs.  Today is no

different and more: that

second cup of coffee

who also needs

careful managing: it means

the difference between

convenience and a heat deep

burn.  And even though

my son and daughter are too big

to carry on my one hip

to bounce and soothe

and achieve maybe it’s

  

the memory, the dragon

I stir in the morning

while the rest of the house

sleep and sleeps:

a whole day’s worth

of folded clothes, empty

of bodies, going cold

in the dim hall, and the coffee

without a drop! poured

held (that hinge of fore-

finger and thumb) and

carried up a dark flight

of stairs, counting one

through the dozen so not

a drop falls on the fresh

bleached uniform

shirts and pressed pants,

the only pair now that

fits--