Entering The Kingdom Poem by Michael McGriff

The summer's gone, now
it's the gray machines
of the rain. 5:30, November,
the sun breaks through
long enough to open something
along the ridge,
then darkness
and more rain.
A woman sits in the middle
of her living room
surrounded by stockpots
filling with the ceiling's
brown rainwater and chunks
of plaster. Her eyes
are the milk of blue granite,
and blind as a salamander's.
Earlier, a man came with a lawyer
who came with a letter
from the city, a letter
condemning her 3½ acres
for the new pipeline.
She believes in many things.
That cayenne should be sprinkled
along the thresholds,
salt along the windowsills.
That the pulse should be taken
each night before entering
the kingdom of sleep.
She believes in her hands,
that the sand scraped
from beneath each nail
contains a desert
where a family of refugees
discusses who will eat
the last of the dried fish.
She keeps
the shadows of her hands
in a jewelry box
beneath the sink.
She keeps
the thoughts of her hands
in a jar of raisins.
She thrusts two fingers
beneath her jawbone
and counts her pulse
backwards from 100
as the sound of water and metal
ferries her into sleep.
She keeps the dream of her hands
in her dream,
where she climbs a rope
into the tree of sadness.
Hands that wind the clock
and hands that divide the fish.