Like a Harp’s Stab at Flamenco
by Carol Durak
How do I walk through autumn
if not through its own slow sound,
autumn, it’s on my tongue, plum-tinged
like a pigeon’s shadow. I laid the white
flower on her stone. Like a harp’s stab
at flamenco, I tried but couldn’t grasp—
like glass against glass—the shatter.
I thought I could bear it, break bread
with it. Instead, a power outage might
keep me coherent. Instead, my heart’s
the courier: beneath the bare oak
she’s hush, past damage. I thought
I’d loathe the word shroud. Instead,
as we wrapped Babushka, in her white cloth
I tucked a lock of my hair.
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