Janet Buck

VOTIVES DOWN TO THE METAL PLATE

Listen to Audio Version read by Jill Khoury.

I'm tired of all this stumbling from countertops
to grab the handle on a door—
fingering a rosary I do not own.
Doctors stretch out sorrow's news;
we don't know if roads to somewhere still exist.
Is this how God leaves dirty dishes in the sink,
no bottled soap, no sponge in sight—
what is left are cut-up rags from nightshirts
worn in sagging beds—to scrub out pots,
broth that simmers all day long, leaves a ring
without the promise of a meal.

My husband puts two Trumpet Vines
beneath a trellis in our yard.
We spent three years in search of these.
"They've grown a foot in just one week."
He's giddy from the thought of rainbows,
building me cathedral windows in the air,
takes this as a mystic signal
pasted somewhere in a cloud.
He's deep inside a wishing well with both his feet,
hoping bumping hopelessness—
moving it a foot a two.

My yardstick has a different face—
I'm votives down to metal plates.
This is all I've ever been with stately candles
all around to make me jealous of their height.
What's warm is just a heating pad
pressed against my aching back.
I only stay to witness all the braiding vines
expel their calming fragrances,
see the shades of salmon pink,
planted there to hand me ropes.
I flip a quarter back and forth
inside a pocket full of holes.

Janet Buck is a seven-time Pushcart Nominee and the author of three full-length collections of poetry. Buck's most recent work has appeared in Boston Literary Magazine, River Babble, The Camel Saloon, Zombie Logic, and Vine Leaves; new poetry will appear in forthcoming issues of Offcourse, Mistfit Magazine, PoetryRepairs, Poetry Magazine, The Milo Review, Antiphon, PoetryBay, and other journals worldwide.