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Sinning (Again) |
The kettle shrieks,
the clothes drier screams,
cats wrap about my legs
with plaintive meows,
plants hang out their leaves
like parched tongues,
and dishes in the sink
stare up with oily eyes
while I play god.
With my smarts I could
have been a secretary,
top notch, efficient,
long fingernails clicking
over a keyboard, could have
snagged a real check,
real benefits, medical
and dental. Old voices repeat this
message, religiously,
it runs circles inside my head.
I listen instead to the radio,
playing noon-time jazz,
a gold-throated trumpet
soaring to celestial high notes
as I turn my back
to the kitchen, and let temptation
lead me on
to my own private Eden,
gloriously spread
over the dining table.
Crumbs of clay, water,
sponges, Q-tips, pins,
kitchen knives, and in the midst
of it all a half-formed figure,
eight inches high, pedastalled,
on what used to be my best
maple wood cutting board,
I the creator mucking about
with clay. Grey, moist,
and primordial it moves
like flesh, muscles appearing
like miracles, my hands shaping,
my own Eve,
her clay head tossed proudly back,
her round-bellied, ripe self
dancing into life without
an Adam,
while I, that first Eve’s
unrepentant descendant,
chuckle, and say:
this is only the beginning
and it is good. Behold!
It is very good.
copyright 2006
Anna
Balint |
