Tucked by Kara Knickerbocker

When I arrive home, my mother is already waiting at the door.

We walk toward the room I grew up in, each movement folded


into silence. She doesn’t know how to ready depression, 

lie down next to it. She only knows that a good cleaning 


involves toughness, makes everything transparent. Like always,

she still wants to make my bed. Rest, you’ll feel better she soothes,


as her hands smooth out fresh sheets, her arms billowing to the sky

as if she was creating heaven. Here, my grief is the mattress & now,


there is something holy about how my body collapses

onto it & she covers me, pure, like a prayer—

Kara Knickerbocker is the author of the chapbooks The Shedding Before the Swell (dancing girl press 2018) and Next to Everything that is Breakable (Finishing Line Press 2017). Her poetry and essays have appeared in: Poet Lore, Construction Magazine, Portland Review, and the anthologies Voices From The Attic, Pennsylvania’s Best Emerging Poets, Crack the Spine, and more. She currently lives in Pennsylvania where she writes with the Madwomen in the Attic at Carlow University. and co-curates the MadFridays Reading Series Find her online at www.karaknickerbocker.com and on Twitter @karaknick.