Castaway by Peggy Hammond

Memories flit close,

dart away:

I’m sitting at the kitchen table

bony knees to flat chest,

feet on chair’s edge,

chair on curled linoleum.

My mother pours coffee

to include me, my cup

small, mostly sugar.

Her brisk movements,

a butter churn, a bubbling pot,

a universe she kept on course.

Older, I see weary eyes,

Note her smile stalls,

half formed. Older,

in dark nights, I hear

jealous rages, threats

of damage or death.

Older, I know her heart

broke long before I

washed ashore, one more

girl seeking safe passage

through a world

seething with men.

---

Peggy Hammond’s recent poems appear or are forthcoming in Pangyrus Literary Magazine, The Comstock Review, For Women Who Roar, Fragmented Voices, The Sandy River Review, Moonstone Arts Center’s anthology Protest 2021, and elsewhere. A Best of the Net nominee, her chapbook The Fifth House Tilts is due out fall 2022 (Kelsay Books).

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