poem by Martha Rhodes


Pattern of Cracks

The plasterer, most assuredly,
hasn't been here (he'd leave his pail
or trowel behind), besides
I haven't left the room all day--
too strange outside:

a 1946 piper-yellow Piper Cub
about to land in my yard
ascends suddenly;
and the orchards cling to their dying leaves
sensing something below's more treacherous
than wind or cold . . .

Difficult to account for the ceiling,
this morning's zig-zagged pattern of cracks
now seamless, no thanks to me,
a step ladder's third rung higher
than I've ever chanced. Impossible
impossible, such fine, expertly
crafted work, faultless as it dries
above me, shrinks and cures.

*

NOTE: I Googled "'Martha Rhodes' Pattern of Cracks"
and came upon this found poem:

Poem

Old men haunt the crack
between my pillows. Days

I spend on the internet ... banjo imprinted
on a gene now notated,

unalterably,

in the pattern of my body.

*

I put it into lines and called it "Poem"