A poem by Isabel Chenot

image by Kseniya Lapteva, on Pixabay

Untitled

to G, my former foster daughter

with all my love

You were unconscious of my hand,

but it was planted where

your nodding head

would fall

jolted against unstable

traffic through the hills.

Even awake,

you would not understand –

your tears salting saliva in your hair.

A long trip had unburied

loss without appraisal,

a day when you were four. You can't recall

it, but it hurts you still.

Could I have soothed your ache –

I only soothed your sleeping.

I hardly saw the slow light fingering the air

or felt the sun spread

on our shoulders, quietly to cradle.

You were asleep – that's all.

Unconscious of my heart, my hand, my breathing.

Unconscious of my heart,

my heart,

repeating.

Isabel Chenot’s work has appeared in Spirit Fire Review, Assisi, Avocet,

Indiana Voice Journal, and Blue Unicorn, among other journals. Her books

include West of Moonlight, East of Dawn (her retelling of an old fairy tale)

and The Joseph Tree. Both are available on Amazon, and The Joseph Tree

is also available through Wiseblood Books.

March 2024 issue