WORK BY JUSTIN HART


Why She Carries String


                                           For luck. To remember
who she's lost and who
she is, not what she does.

To hold her together when
pieces start slipping.
The string is for hanging
her clothes after a long night
standing and kneeling in the rain.

Because sometimes she aches
and it gives her something
to hold. Because
it gets her home
when she wakes up somewhere
strange, with the string
tied round her middle
to separate the good
from the bad.

                           Pontoon #2,Seattle, WA:
                            Floating Bridge Press, 1998.