i.
two women talk and tie colored strings knotting unknotting the ends
bowline loop short-end sheet bend for unexpected complications
how to connect one thin piece to another secure yet easy to undo knot?
like skilled fingers knitting learned movements answers
are known yet unspoken things which is why
winding conversation is familar to me
they speak of binds of family and mixed blood thick
violent as ocean continental divide ancestral drift
and the silence
one woman says
I'm tired of living all the hard stories
her past lies as slithering pieces cut
and fallen or hanging still from her wrists
she quits the task making frayed parts fit
ii.
two women
my friend and my lover let silence hover like bad memories thought discarded
until the tug and pull of remembering slips tighter around their necks
how to slip free from this bind is as simple as swapping strings for cigarettes
letting smoke curl from their fingertips
they speak a language of long pauses and fingered objects
there are no secrets here
like the cut and burn of rough rope the tender tear
is enough and as much as a woman's hand bound
to my thigh and another to my breast and the weight of her touch
feels like healing
iii.
in my disbelief I have told tangled lies about my past
futile convolutions to obscure who I am and who
I might become
truth unwinds as threads of other women's survival and my own
throw me a rope
I will bind my body to your corded flesh
press my lips to your smothered breath
untie my past
ungag my tongue
I will speak our names
we can live
unbounded and let
loose voices
winded
carried
as secure faith
against
unwanted ties
©Ami Mattison
Flickr photo courtesy of adam *b
I love that last verse of section ii.
ReplyDeleteI like the way the poem ends, but wonder if that's really possible? I have more questions than answers, on that.