KEEPERS Poem by Nicolette Stasko

They must still be around somewhere, those old things.
C. P. Cavafy ‘The Afternoon Sun'
Another birthday
card from my sister
nine days late
I rescue it from
the rain-soaked box
on the envelope
a customs slip
I misread ‘pen'
for ‘pin' then feel the
lump with my fingers and all
my years
this moment's utter loneliness
inside
a cheap brooch red and gilt
ballet slippers
slightly chipped
and I whirl
back eons to
my dancing days
when I was eight or seven
and dancing
was everything
the shock is like
a blow to the head
or the wind knocked
out
I breathe deeply
and read
in my sister's curlicue hand
"Remember this?"
It's not
the first time
she's done it
given me back what was mine
I can't figure out
where they come from
how she conjures
them up out of boxes or air
or dust
is it possible
my mother has succumbed
at last mistaken
her daughters completely
and given the wrong one
the other's past?

and now my sister
feeds it drop by drop
transoceans
back to me