I.
I hid them like something
precious—saffron, caviar—
then wrapped in snowflake tissue,
trussed with curled ribbon,
Dad’s yearly
gifts for Mother’s
Christmas stocking:
Paquin’s jarred hand cream,
Tussey deodorant smelling
like cinnamon,
Revlon Oh! So Red! lipstick,
a palm-sized box
of Russell Stover chocolates.
II.
Soon after Mother pierced
her ears in her middle years
her stocking held
a silver-foiled box
of cultured pearl studs
she asked for and wore
until her ear holes closed,
though she always decked
dresses with the pearl
necklace my father
bought for their wedding.
Wanting to change the
worn cord, secure a catch
her palsied hands might
manage, I rescue the flimsy
strand, search a Philly
restoration for her birthday.
III.
The jeweler lifts the
necklace from its plush box,
tooths the beads, whispers
“Synthetic—do you still
want to spend the money?”
Her face signals kind
restraint. I nod, wondering,
even, if they might
bleach the yellowed plastic?
I’m longing, though she never
did, for a posher thing,
labor turned to luxury:
oyster white pearls,
formed from sandy accretion,
shining globes hatched as
protection, adaptation.
Her marrying down
for seven happy decades.
This—this gritty, gleaming
circle I still ache
to nestle in my mother’s
felt stocking, watch her
raise their cold moon
luster to light
the darkness
her final Christmas Eve.
is an award-winning, retired teaching professor of English at Penn State and founder of Chancellor Writing Services. She’s dropped poetry into dozens of literary journals and anthologies, among them: Blue Lake Review, Southern Review, Gyroscope Review, and Oyster River Pages. Kelsay Books published her first poetry collection, Biking Through the Stone Age, in May 2022. Her second collection, American Daughters, also published by Kelsay, will appear in January 2023. She is at work on a third collection entitled Elsewhere, walking and biking, serving as a home chef/caterer, and loving on her friends, family, and dog.
Author’s website: www.vasmithpoetry.com
