← v9n2, Fall 2010Poetry · Volume 9, Number 2
Ochre ii
They have scurried to their moment, this botched alignment
Of the stars & planets. Mother is eye through slat,
She props them all, a juggler stasis-ed on a unicycle,
Dress spilling over chair legs, the Oriental’s
Snaking figurations & rosettes—both parallel
& askew, depth uncertain, the formal
“studio effect” that Mother planned
Disheveled as Burns’s spiky pudding bowl.
Mother labored mightily to still.
A handprint framed in ochre, quickened on a cave wall.
