Twofer Tuesday

That phrase always makes me expect to hear "Panama" and "Hot for Teacher" back to back.

Today on Writer's Digest: love and anti-love.

Here they are, in the opposite order.


Quilts and Love

It’s traditional, beautiful, but not natural. It requires a lot of work.
It’s a warm comfort. Not too hard to mend, though
you’ll see all the patched places. The worst thing
is how hard it is to clean. Too big for your washer.
Too delicate for industrial machines. Sooner or later,
it’ll be too smelly to leave as is. Take it into the open air;
that can help make it fresher. But you’ll never get out
all the stains. On the whole, maybe it’s best to box it up
and shove it deep under the bed. Best to view it
not as something you touch and use, but a beauty you remember.



Rob’s Class Ring

That ring, a heavy gold token
that fits no finger. Maybe you wore it
back then, before our first date. Now
neither of us would slip it on.
But it hasn’t lost its beauty or its use:

hung in a window
its topaz-glass stone
catches sun

hung around my neck
it beats between my breasts
like a second heart

lain in a shallow catch-all dish on my dresser
it’s that foreign thing I find
with my fingers and feel
a rush of delight:

not mine, not quite yours,
just its own sweet self.