Deborah Kelly

❉

Not a clap, but 

a word closed my mouth 

like a headwind.

Every gust 

a synonym

and every word for war.

Into every velvet seat,

the tympani,

as the opera roused

Götterdämmerung.

*

As the opera roused,

I stitched myself

into a knotted oracle.

Into my jacket hood

I hid myself,

a frozen rabbit

in folded time.

*

Time that fell from walls,

from the bell that did not stop.

What point in lessons? 

Grandmothers 

stiffened with starch and time.

*

Grandmothers stiffened time, if they could

iron it to place.

They knew to play statue,

and grandfathers, too, played statue. 

As boots marched by.

*

April. 

April of stunned rabbits.

*

In the websites of five newspapers

I gathered and gathered,

by subscription,

as if night’s boots didn’t march 

under orders

every night.

*

Clocks and bells.

*

April fell

on every velvet seat,

and 

we covered our heads,

little grandmothers.

We live, little grandmothers, 

to cover someone’s head.