The Gloves is a relationship poem, a reflection on the impact of meeting someone, anyone, and a celebration of the joy of togetherness. The inspiration for this came from Pablo Neruda’s Ode to My Socks.
The Gloves – Relationship Poem
My love lent me
The hours it took
To knit a pair of
Green mohair gloves
Green as the leaves
In spring, spilling
The bark’s light, now
Dripping onto
My grey-blue fingers and
stained glass skin,
Unbending digits surprised
By flowery fluff and
Cherry blossoms
Whisking me away
From the canvas.
Seven balls of yarn
It took and many
A mouthful of green grass,
I look at my
cradled fingers,
The skin’s no longer
Crawling,
The paint is fading
And the tips
Lengthen into
Brush-strokes
Shaping in colour
Fat-trunked trees
And bees bathing
In the sun.
All surfaces are
Soft now, the
Clock’s ticking is
Licking the nape of
My neck and
All because of the
Sprouting
hand-knit
Hollow gloves
My love knit
For my
porcelain fingers
A whole month
Long
When leaves
Needed raking
For the grass to
Grow once more
In spring.
Like piecing a pie
My love sliced
Me many a stitch
Twining the yarn
Fibre by fibre
Until the last inch
Lay flat on the tip
Of my thumb
From where now
A snowflake
Dives
Head-first
Onto the page
And smudges
The hours I spent
And the brushstrokes
It took
To draw
My winter garden,
Grey clouds now with
a tinge of scarf crimson,
the snowy lawn bark brown
And the snowflake
has a blade of grass
Running through.
I measured
Your fingers
On mine
My love told me
About Post Author
