October 2023 - Shelves

October, unlike its predecessor September, dares us to ignore time’s passing.  The buoyant, carefree hues of summer have intensified and turned to flames. The days shorten. The air grows crisp. The calendar year nears its end.  Yet, as October reminds us, eternal youth is not the point – not for nature, not even for us.

Shelves

by Kim Keough

I look up from the umpteenth draft of this poem to watch

You prepare the shelves you are building for our books.

How deftly you saw through the knots and sinew. A swatch

Of worn out sandpaper and drill bits lie next to hooks

You’ll use as anchors on our crooked wall

While above you a school of salmon leaves swim

Away from their tree, against the wind. It’s fall

And you know this light won’t last, but you dare it to dim

As you pry off that lid of stain. I cannot understand

What makes you stay when I’ve never built you a thing

As solid or useful, by my own hand—

Just these rough-hewed words which refuse to ring.

I tap on the window. You startle but point to the shelves,

Our moment read then slid back, to keep for ourselves.

Kim Keough (She/Her), received her BA in English from Mount Holyoke College. Her poetry and photography have appeared in Meat for Tea: The Valley Review. She is the former director of Voices from Inside, a writing program for incarcerated and formerly incarcerated women. During the 1990's, Keough made her living as a busker and performed all over the world. She lives and teaches in Western Massachusetts.

"Shelves" first appeared in Meat for Tea: The Valley Review Volume15, Issue 4