Well Worked-In

Dec 8 2015

An old wicker basket.

Stiff caramel canes,

interwoven

in roughly even rows.

Her finger runs

along the hard finish,

its dark absorbent gloss

grudging give.

Bumps across

the weave and weft,

caresses

the braided rim.

How sturdy it is.

And the oval shape

a perfect fit,

snuggling into her tummy

against her hips.

The basket breathes, open to air,

flexes

but stiffly.

And on its deeply burnished handles

the residue of touch

is well worked-in,

dried sweat

and tiny flecks of skin.

Where once again

she hefts it up, descends the stairs.

On Monday morning, laundry overflows,

colours unsorted

socks unpaired.

And washday over

there's always more,

fluff, fold, stack

and back upstairs.

The ritual

of domestic chores,

the burden

of cleanliness.

How week after week

it wears on her.

But the comfort she gets,

the virtue of work.

I saw this photograph of a wicker casket (in a recent New Yorker - http://bit.ly/1MmttMk). Which is just how I'd like to be buried: in a wicker basket, or cardboard box, or simple shroud; with no chemicals, little ceremony, and easily returned to earth.

But I couldn't write another poem about death. It's getting far too morbid!

Fortunately, the picture also recalled my mother's old laundry basket: sturdy wicker, with a patina of age. So that's what the poem became: a pean to domestic chores; a lament at their endlessness.

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