I take Route 21
to Oshkosh all year through
quilt terrain, horse-
drawn Amish buggies
parked in the driveway
of the shop closed
on Sundays near
the spent stone farmhouse,
the girl who sold me
hickory nuts with her
St. Bernard, through
heaping winters, led
only by my love
for the moon. When
you died they put us
on a detour. Well.
When you were sick I tried
stitching you one square --
Tumbling Blocks in
velvet from sliced-up dresses
on sale, by hand each
dark diamond starred
clean, scar-sterile
gauze-filled pocket --
I didn't finish. Detour
ran through good sod
land, prime source
of baler twine. I watched
a girl waiting to cross
21, huge aluminum
mailbox and her hip
out, her elbow cocked;
she thought the boy, the
boy, might pass in his
Trans Am. Wave, girl.
All these passages back:
Tomah, Coloma, Wautoma,
the driveway I tried to reach
my star of wonder and got
a swaddling babe, gurneys,
IV lines, tiles and
skin, the smell of hot
Styrofoam at seven, eight
separate lines, Sweetie,
feeding your heart directly.
Nobody sings much now
when I cross Formica Road.
Could we have sewn in my own
heart? It might seem like
the middle of nowhere out here
but this way is a shortcut,
the truncated gravel just scars.
Betsy Brown, from Year of Morphines (LSU Press)
This poem first appeared in Black Warrior Review.
copyright 2014 Betsy Brown