12/23/11

Storm Shelter
By Laurel Garver


“I have something to show you,”
he sighs more than speaks,
then closet door creaks.
Beneath the starched shirts
and pleated chinos,
he reveals another world:
His bluegreen haven
of soft chenille,
smooth stones,
images of sisters’ laughter
and stretched shadows
on the lakehouse lawn.

He pulls me down
into his cave of comfort,
far from the fracas
of wronged mother
and cad father’s
upper-hand deathdance
that seismically
shook his universe.

Here his curled boybody
once wept and wished
and whispered wants
to Tuggie
the woven wonder,
now lost to the annals
of Linus-like best blankets.

Today, his boyhearted manbody
enfolds me like a second skin,
as he breathes in my love—
that stillcenter of slow
hope for him
to grow up
bold and whole.


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Laurel Garver is a writer and magazine editor whose work has appeared in Flashquake, Motley Press, Rubber Lemon, Drown in my Own Fears and is forthcoming in Joyful!. An indie film enthusiast and incurable Anglophile, she lives in Philadelphia with her husband and daughter. You can visit her blog at http://laurelgarver.blogspot.com.