MONDAY

The baskets of towels left by the curl-chested lover

Are washed in the mountain stream and dried in the light

Of the mid-day moon. The washerwoman, fed on buttered bread,

Remembers the snuggling on the sheets and carries in her womb

The blunt-headed seeds and aches. Her back breaks from

Washing and all her body is limp from

Him who thrusts upon her the weight of love.

Such a woman, her fair face turned to the moon's tide,

Must have been my great grandmother, on the German,

The paternal side, a name lost,

Now, to some unknown Ohio grave,

Her husband a cobbler, the same whose

Tools I display on the mantel, antiques

For which I have no use, next to his picture,

A daguerreotype, a mere boy in puffed shirt-sleeves,

My great grandfather, whose name I do know,

Jakob, a murderer. I am so nervous. It must be

The sins of the fathers. It is him I must blame.

But my heart reaches out to that woman

Who did his wash on Monday, the moon's day,

Her life and the triumph of her broken sorrow.