Twenty-eight wedded years—
pearls slipped from silk thread
knotted in lace. Tonight, we set
our clocks forward, and time confounds
us utterly. Maybe that’s why neither
of us can sleep in this Victorian
hotel, floors sinking, mattress
slanted, desk battered, and the baby
in the next room waking to cry.
Twenty-eight years wick away
while we lie here, alert, sifting.
I dredge memory’s dark glints,
cannot recall your mother at our wedding
though I know she’s in the photos.
Now, if she’s lucky, she’ll be spared
the pain and muddle—ease off soon,
long before the next pearl is tied.
I’d like to cradle the wailing baby
in my arms, cup it to my shoulder, hold it
there until the hours of fleeting sleep
dissolve into morning, until time swivels
and spring’s strand of light is long.
–
Annette Sisson’s poems can be found in Birmingham Poetry Review, Rust and Moth, The Citron Review, The Lascaux Review, Typishly, One, and others. Her book, Small Fish in High Branches, was published by Glass Lyre Press in 2022. She was a Mark Strand Scholar for the 2021 Sewanee Writers’ Conference and 2020 BOAAT Writing Fellow.