“August Thistle” by Sonya Schneider

September 26, 2024Posted by

Forage by Tammy Nara, mixed media watercolor of a thistle on an expressive blue and brownish pink background

Image: “Forage” by Tammy Nara. “August Thistle” was written by Sonya Schneider for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, August 2024, and selected as the Editor’s Choice.

__________

Sonya Schneider

AUGUST THISTLE

Now that their bodies hurt, they listen
from their bedroom window
to the goldfinch song—
 
sweet repetition, it sounds
like po-ta-to-chip with a very
even cadence.
 
Wild canaries, says Pa.
They must be feeding
on thistle seed, says Mom.
 
My younger brother sleeps
facing the wall, in the room
across from them. Every night,
 
they lift him to his bed, change
his diaper, tuck the blue quilt
with green squares
 
around his fetal bend.
After forty-two years, there is still
that awkward moment
 
when he wets their hands
with his warm piss. He is music
without words. Still, I ask—
 
When will it be time
to find him a different home?
My father looks out across the dense
 
thicket of invasive species:
prickly-winged stems, bright
purple flowerheads,
 
releasing into the wind.
We love the birds so much, Pa says.
Wild canaries, Mom says.
 
Their bristle-like spines shine
in the moonlight. My brother
sings in his sleep.
 

—from Ekphrastic Challenge
August 2024, Artist’s Choice

__________

Comment from the series editor, Megan O’Reilly: “The thistle depicted in this image is bold, sharp, and undeniably beautiful, and in ‘August Thistle,’ we witness the sharp beauty of love as we watch an older couple care for a beloved adult child with disabilities while enduring the hardships of their own aging bodies and minds. I love the way the poet subtly connects the ‘sweet repetition’ of birdsong to the dailiness of caregiving tasks, and how much she reveals through the father’s response to the question of rehoming the child: ‘We love the birds so much.’ There is love in the way the poem speaks of this family, love in the parents’ devotion to their child, love in the way the couple admires the birds and the flowers, love and pain coexisting: ‘prickly-winged stems, bright / purple flowerheads.’”

Rattle Logo