Weather Report: Summer-Fall
—For Annie Lawrie Robbins
The steady northeast wind stirred up summer’s dust;
by sunrise, the clean wash hung in the garret again.
Clouds clustered across the midday sky, banded
thunderstorms forcing farmers back inside.
While out gunning, Maria’s brother shot off
his thumb today.
Inside, there was sweeping to be done, on the stove
the rendering of fats, the tallow and the lard.
In the shed, sodium hydroxide dripped into the vessel
beneath the hopper where wood ash lye was made.
The soft soap filled a wooden barrel, beside the tomatoes
waiting to be canned.
Mother is not well today. I wish she’d never fall ill.
I read to her from Women of the Bible, the stories
of common ladies, of matriarchs and queens,
before I returned to scrubbing and tending
to a hundred little things.
Tomorrow, I will put up pumpkin pies,
gather autumn leaves, preserve in wax
their beauty, my hard work.
