SAUCER
The blind cat drinks from me.
I am a circle inside another circle.
Where the stone hit I was born
and there will I also die
but not before making a little
clacking noise with my sister
and taking some heat. Someone
has to catch hell, small milky spills,
sweet brown drips.
It might as well be me
sitting quietly bearing coals
across my back.
I am what holds the brewed cup,
beauty to be broken, sighed over,
swept up and thrown away.
—from Rattle #28, Winter 2007
Tribute to Nurses
__________
Jeanne Bryner, RN, BA, CEN: “I like to wear aprons and hang sheets on the line to dry. The sun’s breath gets caught in the cotton flowers, however briefly. I was born in Appalachia, and once, I saw God do a magic trick with a veil of morning mist. My neighbor’s silo and barn were cut in half, and later they both stood up whole and unhurt.”
