Mångata

from Swedish, the path moonlight lays over water

The ghost child fastens
his mouth to yours,
breathes your breath
from you so you cannot
cry out.
He drew you creek side,
where you hung terrified,
gripping the deep-shaded
undercut bank above wild
rushing water, until finally
I heard you, came running.

What the drowned boy wants forever:
his mother, in time.
What he found:
a playmate his age.

You,
eyes the color of seafoam,
the shining helmet of your
bowl-cut hair bright as
mångata over dark sea.

Tell me, lost ones: When
the moon melts, what
will we do with all that gold?

Standing Up in a Slim Boat

after a line by Tomas Tranströmer

Freed from not knowing where you are,
I’ve traded the nagging worry for a shroud.

In the slim boat of each day, I stand
wary, look across the still surface.

Balance is all.  The undercurrent, strong.
Not the peace I hoped for, this calm.

Cathie Sandstrom

2017

Releasing the Birds

Next to her embroidered lawn handkerchiefs
my mother's empty gloves lay
paired in the nest of her drawer: 

short white Easter ones that stopped at the wrist; 
netted crocheted gloves for summer; an ecru pair
four inches past her watchband, the backs detailed
 
with three rows of stitching raised like fine bones;
three-quarter length pigskin to wear under coats; 
black lace for cocktails, white for weddings;

sexy gloves with gathers up the length so they'd
look like they were slouching; the knitted 
Bavarians, Loden green, stiff as boiled wool.

My first prom dress—strapless, floor-len

Cathie Sandstrom

2017

On a Succession of Mornings

The wheelbarrow. 
Stakes and string. The rake.
Stacks of paving stones. 
The foldable workbench. The saw. 
The man grizzled and gaunt. Plaid
shirt faded above work pants, 
his scuffed brown boots.

The earth bared, rake-leveled
and pounded flat. Him kneeling, 
setting the cut pavers into a pattern
he starts with a central Moravian star,
a design best seen from above.

What I know: that Nature will not wait.
Green will push up between the stones.
The pavers, laid like pastilles on the tongue, 
will disappear edges first as if melting, 
to be swallowed invisible.

Cathie Sandstrom

2017

Poems

Mångata

More by this poet

Standing Up in a Slim Boat

Releasing the Birds

On a Succession of Mornings

Poems

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Mångata

More by this poet

Standing Up in a Slim Boat

Releasing the Birds

On a Succession of Mornings

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