Scribe Scribble Painter

What does it take to clear

a space where once slept

a teen daughter. Her discarded

tidbits still here. Mismatched
pencils, erasers hardened.

I hear the scratch of tree

limbs she told as a girl

woke her at night. I sit
now in this room I’m
claiming for study.

She could come back

and claim her green felt frog,

book marks, her stolen
designer sunglasses resting
in hard cases. Her discarded

eye shadow and stubs of sage.

Silver pinkie rings she took off
and bottles of tincture, Singer's
Saving Grace. (She's only a
seven hour drive away.)

I’ve scraped the stick ‘um

from the closet doors, emptied

the small red rolling cart of
Screaming Yellow Zonkers and
licorice whips. A clean slate.
A cleared place for mother writer
A narrow stage A margin A rural
wooden table to take and name.

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