Everyone Needs to be Touched

The summer that lines the sky.
The air rushing into walls. The window
cleaner that soaps a shady glass.
In a sidewalk crack, the plotting bindweed.

The blue heron that shuttles swallowed-smelt
from lake to reservoir. The stalking SUV, the sun.
On rising irritation, the bald eagle, the dotty bird
egging him away from her eggs.

Like pecan sauce, irritation drizzles over this world.
The mourning doves that plead: love me, everyone
needs to be touched. Some lady
scrubs childhood off her hands.

The clothes-washer drum that rolls. The dishes
that climb over each other in the sink. We are
all parts in a looming dishslide. A roll
reverses the washer’s drum.

“Don’t touch anything!” says the cleaner. Scrubbed
childhood drains in a sink, pooling
like pecan sauce over this world. Love
me, nag the doves.

Egging him away from her eggs
a small bird engines an eagle. The sun,
an engined SUV. Mangled smelt is
now shuttles between reservoir and lake.

A plotting bindweed waits in the concrete’s fault.
A window cleaner wipes his image off the glass.
The wall airs emergency. Rushing,
summer crackles up the sky.

About the Author

Ravitte Kentwortz is an immigrant to the US. She started writing poetry in English late in life. She represents those older women who have not yet learned to use their own voice. Her poems appeared in Bare Life, The Minnesota Review, The Portland Review, MARY, Posit, Caliban and others.