During the night
Another fall, hip
fracture: a new surgeon
aligning bone and
metal, charting a course for
your 96-year-old frame
on a vague sea, more
dream than distance with markers
aimed to carry you
home, only you’re no longer
sure what home means: not
the farm where you rode
a pony and fed chickens,
not the house where you
raised children and lost your mate,
not the well-appointed rooms
of your single life.
Wait: some forward motion, some
backward drift, youthful
hands supporting your back, calm
as a mother with her small child,
something said softly
then a door closed. Journey and
dream confused, tangled
like this too thin sheet wishing
itself a sail, homeward bound.
Laurel Smith lives in Vincennes, Indiana, and happily participates in projects to promote literacy, the arts, social justice, and public health. Her poems have appeared in various journals, including Natural Bridge, New Millennium Writings, English Journal, Tipton Poetry Journal, and Flying Island; also in the following anthologies: And Know This Place; Mapping the Muse; Visiting Frost.