Mom’s getting even this evening,
going mum. I’m not sure why.
I bask in the silence.
She plays solitaire, flicks
a Queen over, four-
pointed red diamond:
too solid star, opaque.
No one can read her omens
and signs. She wears
a square-cut diamond
on her ring finger too:
it lets light but not seeing
through, sparks and glints
as she clicks the cards.
Seven, I’m playing
Ginny doll, dressing
and undressing her,
walking her up a chair leg.
Or I imagine we’re sliding
the phone line’s slight curve,
sheer girls whose bodies
are lenses. Look through me:
Mom can. I blur
when the rain shower
bead-dances leaves and roofs,
stutters along the wires
where Ginny and I balance.
Sunset ripens the pour
I wear, nylon girl.
I do not bask after all
in the ask and why.
I endure.
Mom shuffles the cards,
and they sigh, a slight breeze.
The diamonds and hearts
are Valentine-red, but
the spades and clubs
are dour: upside-down
hearts, black clovers.
Can I pluck luck?
She loves me….
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 21, Issue 4.
Mary B. Moore’s books include the full-length Flicker, winner of the 2016 Dogfish Head award, and Eating the Light, winner of Sable Books’ 2016 chapbook award. Cleveland U. published The Book Of Snow (1998). Amanda and the Man Soul (winner of EMRYS chapbook prize) is forthcoming in late 2017.
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