Seasoned with Thyme

—225 Church Street, Burlington, Vermont: 1964

She feels weightless as she unlocks the door

despite the infant in her arms, twelve pounds

of wiggle and warmth, to step into the tiny apartment,

painted an edgy greenish-blue, dissonant

as an untuned flute, and yet “It’s ours,” she thinks

as she glides through the two rooms, sneakered feet

barely touching the worn carpet, the faded gray linoleum floor.

“Home!” she tells the baby, unbuttoning his sweater,

gentling him onto the hand-me-down sofa bed.

She feels her life unfolding now, like the pages

of a musical score, days absent exams, term papers,

a professor’s droning voice, without the upspoken

expectations of her parents’ home. Hours she can infuse

with her own pianissimo: a morning nap, perhaps,

an adagio afternoon stroll. Capriccio─

double-timing it into town for a cup of tea,

a lively tour of Woolworths Five and Ten.

Afternoons she sings with the Beatles, unobserved

except by the child propped on the counter,

her off-tune lyrics spinning at 45 RPM into the kitchen

redolent of formula, onions and Velveeta cheese.

They dine on an oilcloth-covered table on a budget

of $15.00 a week, supermarket bargains except

for trips to the nearby butcher, a smiling, burly man

who boosts her culinary skills by scribbling instructions

on shiny white butcher paper: Eye of round: 325 °

40 mins. Season w/ salt, pepper. Fresh sprig of thyme. 

Evenings, the baby asleep in a corner in a bureau drawer,

her husband opens the sofa bed into a tangle

of blankets and wrinkled sheets and she lays down,

her arm across his chest, content in this solace..

This harbor. The assurance of skin.