Matthea Harvey

Setting the Table

To cut through night you'll need your sharpest scissors. Cut around the birch, the bump of the bird nest on its lowest limb. Then with your nail scissors, trim around the baby beaks waiting for worms to fall from the sky. Snip around the lip of the mailbox and the pervert's shoe peeking out from behind the Chevy. Before dawn, rip the silhouette from the sky and drag it inside. Frame the long black stripe and hang it in the dining room. Sleep. When you wake, redo the scene as day in doily. Now you have a lacy fence, a huge cherry blossom of a holly bush, a birch sugared with snow. Frame the white version and hang it opposite the black. Get your dinner and eat it between the two scenes. Your food will taste just right.

Matthea Harvey
Setting the Table first appeared in Cue, Winter 2005, Volume II, Issue I.

Poem, copyright © Matthea Harvey, 2006
Appearing on the Fishouse with permission
Audio file, copyright © 2006, From the Fishouse

Posted on January 30, 2006 6:57 AM