Hathaway

Each day the hurdles come.

The phone calls.

The sleepless nights.

The pull of faces and lives

I have no business knowing anything about.

I sit in the chair.

A twisted wreck of arms

and legs

each one determined to find its way

out

in the opposite direction of the other.

Here at my desk

I listen to the robins’ call

and watch the grass grow taller.

Words I once thought had meaning,

stare back at me

like lost children

desperate

to find their way

home.

It used to be so simple,

sitting and writing,

like picking figs from my grandmother’s

backyard.

Cramming

the sweet purple flesh

into my mouth

and dropping the skins on the lawn

for others to eat.

The Texas sun,

hot on my little girl legs.

My Sunday-school sandals

white leather new,

with the shiny silver buckles

running from fig to fig

as if I were gathering secrets.

My collarbone long healed

from the fall

I took in the 

Bob's Big Boy restaurant.