qarrtsiluni

by Katherine Glatter

Flesh and metal collide
road kill sets with asphalt

The small mammal bones
I dug up last fall

one cervical vertebra
one miniature femur
one blackened fossa

Back to one
is
the hope I pin my life on
is
brushing my daughter’s hair
tasting your mouth in mine
raking the dirt with my bare hands

Written on the bones of the dead
is knowledge free from pain

is the hieroglyph for hope

Download the MP3

Katherine Glatter is returning to writing poetry after many years’ hiatus. She has been a massage therapist since 1988. She moved from to Amherst, Massachusetts in 2000 to become a teacher of the Alexander Technique, completing her training in 2003. She has always loved words as well as the workings of the body, inside and out. She is also a Sacred Harp singer, a pursuit she took up after moving to New England.