A sTORY FOR my MOTHER

My mom is particular about Halloween cobwebs. You know, the polyester ones that come bunched up and shiny in a thin plastic bag, waiting to be stretched to their decorative form.

As children, my brother and I would pull them across the the branches and needles of the colossal pine in our front yard with mother directing from the walk below: “Pull them very gently, guys—stretch them as much as you can and they’ll look real. Don’t leave clumps, kids, that’s tacky!”

My ambition to please outweighed my limited dexterity at seven, so I would separate the mess of plastic with great care, tongue extruded in concentration, delicately placing each individual strand as I climbed higher into rough branches, sticky with autumn sap. When Mom would shout from below, “Oh, Clairey, that’s a good one!” I would glow with pride.

And so the cycle continues: now I, too, am a self-appointed Halloween cobweb aficionado. Each October, when I inevitably see clumpy, careless webs pulled haphazardly across the windows of Williamsburg, I scoff at the tragedy of carelessness, I yearn to reach in and pull the webs to their taut potential. Then I think of my mother standing on the old walk, calling directives and encouragements to her minions above, and I can’t help but smile at how much she’s imparted to me and how much I’ve become like her — in this small way and in so many wonderful others.

VENA AMORIS

On top of the gearshift,

his hand under mine,

anchored in bone.

Late summer,

wind whips

through downed windows.

Stay, cankered branch,

peeled skin of cicada.

Is that crickets or locusts?

Winter will know.

We could shatter at any time.