Take naps—on the grass, by a stream, or on a couch with a view. Keep a notebook nearby, so that when you are drowsily awake, you can write without thinking. Write out of all the musical, infinitesimal, and vertical places in your imagination. Take the words home; let them rest too. Then revise and craft.
- Renée Ruderman |
You can't see
my mother's face in the sketch,
but the angle of her shoulder
weighted by a backpack
and her hand reaching
for the suitcase handle mean
she's leaving.
She's leaving the woman
in the background
whose thin fingers wrote
messages on her back,
whose photo will soon
fill the bare seasons.
whose mittened hands
cover her eyes.
Two women in heavy coats,
thick boots, and matching berets;
the space between them filled
by what can't be said.
My mother will turn first
to the West,
the wind on her neck,
the smell of damp wool
and the eagle stamped in her passport,
dowry enough for the new world.