Two Poems by Russell Brakefield

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KNIT, PURL

Years of skeins wound down,
she’s mastered a sort of reverse nesting

all our friends warmed
by her handiwork.

We’ve arrived at an agreement
about children, each with a bag

of reasons as to why we can’t knit
new life of our own.

As for loneliness, we’ve yet to know
what will last. Are the things you make

the same as mine? Handsome and rotten
with all that’s left to come.

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PYROMANIAC

On the porch, my father
wears his workday out

in the open. He’s telling
the sitter about the fires

about my recent interest
in spectacle, in ruin.

But I thought we’d agreed
not to say. That I’d be his

tiny madman and he my
silent partner. That each

collapse I forged would
be partly his to claim.

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