"The Wednesday Gloves" by Karen Poppy

The Wednesday Gloves

You can and do choose.
Fine cake or country bread,
Satin slippers or wooden shoes,
Beef bourguignon or cabbage head.

Today you choose this:
Pale blue British Isles sky,
Garden disordered with roses,
White gloves for pruning, shelter nearby.

Thin leather fingers, seamed
Candlesticks, fingertips
Waxed soft, polished and cleaned.
Pale palms smooth as petaled lips.

Each velvet bud you nip
With those shears calms
The mind, allows you to slip
Into a simpler place, nursemaid's arms.

All the charms of rustic delight.
Then you discard the gloves,
Wear silk at night.

Karen Poppy

Karen Poppy has work published or forthcoming in ArLiJo, Wallace Stevens Journal, Parody Poetry Journal, Young Ravens Literary Review, and Voices de la Luna, among others. She has recently written her first novel, is at work on her second novel, and is an attorney licensed in California and Texas. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Headshot: Lorelei Ghanizadeh

Photo Credit: Tiffany Cook