Tonight's Poet Corner: Spokes & Patterns

Spokes & Patterns
by Belinda Roddie

Passed a blue and weary minivan
on my way home from the bookstore. Its
engine was revved. The splinters in my side

were as big as kings, hovering over a
twenty-one speed throne. When I carried
my bicycle to the gate of our complex,

I saw that the mail had not
been checked. Unbeknownst

to me, you were two buildings down
by that blue and weary minivan, smoking
the black pipe I carved you for Christmas,
your fingers like needles sewing into the seams

of a young man's embroidered chest. He liked
the way you touched him. He told me so
when he saw me carrying boxes to my father's

car, and laughed after I slapped him. Now
the pain in my hips dances like a court jester
for a new majesty. I ride my bike to my father's
house, pulling at the loose threads where you used

to stitch your initials into my skin, and with every
undone knot, I become freer.