001 An Old Mother's Wash Poem by Lori Boulard

Only she knows the ritual's worth-
the tactile truth of scrubbed
and spun generations in cloth.
Neatly folded squares of mother
and child in wicker on the stair.

It all comes out in the wash;
an old wives' tale indeed.
Spring greens and summer reds
bleach clean into the runoff, but
sins and joy fuse to fibers
remaining as traces in the weave,
interlocked until the moths gain ground,
the patterns of family tattooed
to wool and broken bone.