Mute

I had been on the waitlist at the library for the book I'd been hearing raves about for many months - The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo. When I received an email saying the book was in for me, I practically ran to the library. To my disappointment, after four or five chapters in, I closed the book and returned it for the next eager reader. It wasn't for me. And I consider myself to be an uncluttered, minimal-loving, being. In what little I read, though, I was inspired to (in my own way) begin a major cleanup of my closet, which I hadn't done since we moved into our home almost seven years ago. I began with my feet on a step stool and reached the highest shelf. I pulled down three small boxes. Family heirlooms. Letters I had written to my grandpa after my grandma had passed away. Jewels. And then I opened a small orange box with Frida Kahlo on the top and my heart went still. The clay magnolia blossom I wore in my updo on my wedding day. Little square ultrasound images of my babes in my womb. The two glass bead on silk string necklaces I made for myself for each pregnancy with my hands and wishes and prayers, talismans for safe and healthy pregnancies and deliveries. An old Montana driver's license. And one small orange, leather journal. And in those pages, exactly three poems and the lyrics to A Pirate Looks at Forty. I don't remember writing the poems. I Googled lines from the first pages. Were these my words? (They seem to be!) I never made it past that first top shelf in my attempt to declutter and reorganize. In my own way. In my own time. Poem #1.
Mute
I saw her today and
she was sawing,
the teeth
making an unbearable sound gnawing
at the wood
slivering
brutalizing
back and forth
back and forth.
She did not think
to kick it
in two
she kept sawing
until
it
was
perfectly split. Her wood
beautifully
cut
but
she was not singing.
She was walking
her body
beat down and
screaming inside
echoes
silent o's
her quietness left her
unheard
about that.
Now
she found the water
heart pounding
teeth aching from the
sawing
the pounding.
She only feels herself empty
all's lost here.
Today the stream did not carry
her spirit or
her
dreams.
She ached even more
in nature. Today the bird
did not
sing.