Everyone knows sex is for men
my aunt said at eighty two—
between bites of quiche, sips of tea.
My young cousins and I stared
at our plates, shifted in our seats.
Chaste for thirty years
after her husband died, she put
sex on the table. Family matriarch
ready to tell all. One sexual partner
her entire life. A mercurial man,
moody, dark – quick with a bark.
Left with three boys to raise alone,
she praised him—love story
of her life. She wore slippers,
better to walk on eggshells.
Held her tongue. Unable to say
what gave her pleasure. This spot,
not there, here yes, right there.
Sex more duty than desire.
Repetitive like laundry.
As she spoke to us, oxygen
finally filled her lungs.
*
SILENT NIGHT
There are no airport runs
no one coming home to us.
Drive of wonder, glow of lights—
each year, we carry the biggest
tree into the house. Whiff of pine
on my hands, perfume.
Fills the space where kids
should be. Blinking color, angels
on their knees, amaryllis
about to burst. The image,
my three brothers and me,
five in the morning.
Huddled in one bedroom.
Oldest can tell time, still too early.
My father’s firm hand against the wall.
Why can’t you be like you were,
last treasure, a tangerine
in the toe of my stocking.
*
FOR FLORENCE
The cold bit off my fingers the day I buried you.
Jackhammer opened the earth.
Slabs of dirt to welcome you.
Not sun or birds or green pillow to kneel on.
This is when I turned solid,
fire hose in winter.
Nylon stockings covered my feet.
Your warm glow given at birth –
now a thin muslin shroud, no blanket.
A dull ache of clouds shivered with damp.
My head bowed to cut the wind.
Priest’s vestments blew black in snow.
I can’t leave you in the cold.
Grief still has me on my back,
boot at my throat.
I take in the plants at night so they don’t die.
I can’t remember your hands.
*
M.L. Hedison is an emerging poet based in the coastal town of Wakefield, R.I. She is a former advertising creative director and writer. Her work explores themes of absence, longing, and her Armenian family through lyrical verse. She has been writing poetry for three years and continues to study with Jennifer Franklin, Martha Collins and Wyn Cooper. M.L. is so grateful to have her work published for the first time in ONE ART.
Wonderful poems; love the ending “a tangerine / in the toe of my stocking.” Thank you.
Congratulations ML! Love these poems. You captured the “aunt” to perfection – someone we all have in our lives somewhere. Your description of Christmas morning helped me relive my own childhood experiences. What beautiful memories. And Florence…I wish I had met her.
Very moving poems.
I’m dedicating this to my mom who told me how much she hated to leave her mom in the cemetery in the snow. I wrote a poem about my mom’s hands years ago. I’m missing her today. Your poems are heart warming and heart wrenching at the same time.
ML -these are so very moving and evocative! Thank you for mustering the courage to share them with “all of us” – because many of us share the experiences you limn so beautifully and fluently, but we lack the words or word-skill to proclaim them.
I was especially taken by Silent Night, for two reasons: (1) the challenges of figuring out Christmas, as adults having no children to have grown up to share their adult lives and their further families with us; and (2) my delighted childhood memories of finding a tangerine in the toe of my stocking whenever we went for Christmas to “Granny Woo’s” house.
She always called them “satsumas.”
I loved that.
All very touching, but Florence (my beloved aunt’s name) especially got to me and I feel that boot.