For nephews, goddaughter, so many second cousins,
with prayers looped and tugged, pushed and pulled:
scarves, bonnets, sweaters with their pearly buttons,
in stripes or cables, in cotton or in wool;
soft gifts for their soft bodies, these gestures
roping me, perfectly willing, to their lives;
I recall each piece, its colours and its textures,
the stitches and patterns long memorized.
Tucked in a closet, wrapped in plastic bags,
lies a folded blanket, the one I do not touch,
but think of now and then, when evening lags,
unfinished—yet perfect in my mind’s hot clutch—
still on its needles, in rows taupe and blue,
waiting for the unseen one, my little you.
— from Juniper Volume 7, Issue 3