Sunday, March 16, 2014

Tuesday Poem: From The Notebook

 
Cinderella's Daughter

Nights, when the servants were
deeply asleep, my mother
traded her lace for homespun,
her crown safely
back in its lock box,
my father abed  and dreaming,
adrift on the ship of state.

I watched her in secret
as she danced with the broom,
bent and crooned to the dustpan,
fondled the stiff little bristles
on the idle head of the scrub brush.

Work called to her, it was
her secret, her benediction,
kneeling in the ashes,
sweeping the hearth
cleaner than it sometimes
already was, scrubbing
the stones in the hallways
till they sang a hushed
song of gratitude
beneath our feet.

All of life's ugly voices
gradually silenced by her hands,
rosy from running water,
dancing over every surface,
making me a tapestry
that told the complicated
story of her entry into Paradise.

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