Mother sews
in the candlelight,
where the sun on column wax
flicks her shadow
in beat with the wind.

She’s steady,
always has been—
embroidery laced in funeral banners
for soldiers,
Flesh sniveling her thread;
blood on the carpet.

She has pricked herself only twice,
once when I came back from war, however long ago.
Red weeped from her nails, jam on pale peach,
rust.

The windowsill shakes 
when I come through the door this night
-hinges squeal 
with the pigs in the pen.

I come in, candle whispering-
flicking mother’s shadow,
still and cold with needle spilling red.