Can this be it,
this quiet table, ordinary,
honey-warm and smooth as acorns,
lit by a century’s slanting suns
through evening western windows?
Can this be it,
this fine stripped pine,
stripped
to bare essentials,
its tall-turned legs too poised,
too clean,
for shadowed housemaids, staring
into chapped, red hands,
their shoulders aching from those
much too heavy trays?
Can this be it,
its simple drawer
still fronted with its hand-dark,
wooden knob,
cracked and sprung now in a
fanning peacock’s tail,
all emptied of its patchwork
hopes,
its pins and letters,
hoarded pennies, scraps of tape,
and fingered ribbons from a
long-gone, laughing lad?
Can this be it,
this plain, still presence,
this patient waiting friend?
If this so quiet table,
here beneath my hand,
should come to be my singing,
serving angel
I will line its drawer with
dreams...
(May,
1986)
