The Music in Her

Mother says her femurs dream inside
her thighs, longing to be flutes or horns played
by breezes and if her ribcage could have its way,
rain would tap it like a xylophone.
She insists her bones refuse to drift away
mute as ashes down some weedy stream,
nor will they abide a breathless box beneath
the earth. Please promise me, she says,
that you'll lay me down for coyotes and flies
on a naked plain out west, then watch
while, one by one, white instruments rise,
begging to be tuned. Mother says:
Sing with me, sing now. Let's rehearse.

Copyright © 2008 Richard Jordan All rights reserved
from Redivider
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission