Polishing Silver

[rowens]

This is simply another take on the shaping tone of this poem.



Under mother's watch, we grasp
two bowls of water, two stained rags,
while father goes to wash the car.

We'd run inside and begged to help
mother bake her sweet potatoes.
She must have seen us out the window
as we threw gravel in the yard.

What else could explain the cloth
and piles of silverware,
all splayed across the table?

Everything is tarnished; knives
and forks, the spoons we use to serve,
our faces when given the chore,
our hands. Everything is tarnished.