Portrait

She is holding on
to her hair,
uncoiling the strands,
slowly wiping her
charcoal life
off the perilous page.

Soot falls
through the floorboard
cracks
where one day
outlandish voices will
ring, unknown mouths,
tongues, the growing
of children measured
on doors.

Where age stained
hands mend,

stop mending
what is
unwanted;

new things
impossible
to bear.
1