Bowl
In Feng Shui, they say that chipped crockery
attracts bad qi. My mother is a broken
bowl, early twentieth century, provenance
Auchtertool. The Japanese rebirth broken
pots through process of Kintsugi, through which
shards are soldered together with liquid gold.
My mother's anger sears white hot as solder.
She's a crooked spring, a mangled Jack-in-the-Box
that jump-shocks the moon-faced crowd. What
have I done – but the witch in her burns hot,
itching for mischief: she will hurt me if she can.
Lo, her eyes are white-hot pins for poppets.
I have my pool of the self-same ore. Holding it
from others requires that I run to sea or woods
and let the waves or wind wash it away; let
the waves or boughs break – not my little bowl.
Zoë Green is a Scottish poet who lives in the Thuringian countryside. She has won a Candlestick Press award, been shortlisted for the 2022 London Magazine Poetry Prize and been longlisted for the 2023 Spelt Poetry Prize. She received "Highly Commended" in the Scots poetry category of the 2023 McLellan Poetry Competition. When she’s not writing poetry, she’s teaching literature, boxing, walking her Brittany spaniel or doing yoga. She can stand on her head for several minutes at a time.
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