I.
I turned around to leave and the house
sealed up.
I meant my husband.
I meant his wife. I meant to take the dry
clothes off the line at the end of the day
but there they all are still waving
months later
little tattered flags of
a summer I can’t remember
for all this cold
for the refrigerator door left open all night
and the bottles and jars looking out
into the moonless kitchen,
no stars at all to wish on.
II.
Everything
even my daughter carving a pumpkin
is a lesson on gardening.
How after I washed the seeds.
I dried the seeds on a kitchen towel.
I pecked them off
all but a few that were stuck.
I went to the porch and whipped the towel
over the freshly turned garden dirt.
In a year I’ll wonder
where did those pumpkins came from?
III.
And then sometimes,
as if to air himself out,
my husband opens all his
windows,
all his doors.
I closed my eyes
and my arms,
as if they are their own things,
flew up into trees and swung
back and forth
back and forth.
2024 Finalist Submission for Penned: Poetry