Today my good friend and officemate, Shelley, mentioned to me that she has always liked my "Gary" poem from yesterday's post, but in fact, her favorite was probably this one, "Braided Lives." I had not thought about this poem for a very long time and it is in truth, a favorite of mine too. As I re-visited it today, I could not help but think of the many discussions I have had in class with my English 20 students this semester: how challenging it is, and not often very comfortable, placing ourselves in someone else's skin. It is simpler and easier not to...yet to get to the truth, I think we have to keep trying.
BRAIDED LIVES
Maybe I enjoy not-being as much as being who I am. –Stanley Kunitz
This is not an accident:
I find a tooth in a pocket of asphalt
winking at me like a new quarter and
as I bend to claim it I hear
my mother’s voice like a familiar blanket
settling in my brain saying it’s a fine line a very
thin fine line between the lucky and the
not-so-lucky because this tooth
large adult dull-white
has a story and it begins with a woman
in a budget motel just off some highway
room 16 at the far end of the parking lot boasting
a view of the Beacon station she is wearing
only underwear only a faded mint green slip she leans
up against a quilted dingy beige headboard
a plastic cup of ice pressed against one eye
the eye that is swollen shut with purple bruises
some game show is on the television but she is
not listening the painting above the dresser
reminds her of a jewelry box her aunt gave her
on her ninth birthday painted with white and
yellow daisies a field so thick with color you could
probably hide from someone for a long time
which reminds her to check the door once more
yes it’s locked presses a finger into the bloody
hole in her gum lights another cigarette
this slight shadow of a woman whose life
for a moment has postponed my own.
--Catherine Fraga
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