Grounding Lavender by Elisa Rowe
Wrap a scarf like
kneading dough, pool
a little lavender to graze
my cheek.
My body, a slipping
finger on a piano. My
body, trembling into tune.
I want to be soft like
belonging. I want
my neurons to fire a
country into memory.
Routine is like a house on
feathers. Neurodivergence,
equally nebulous, like rocking
planes and clicks of
language.
Take this shimmering fact about
rabbits: when mothers give
birth they call it kindling.
Soft things, born in
cracklings.
Today I will fold this
woven thing to breathe
what is left of flowers,
whispering lavender,
lavender, crackling,
crackling.
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Elisa Rowe (Crawley) (she/her) is a neurodivergent immigrant, writer, educator, and poet. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in: Michigan Quarterly Review, SAND Journal, the International Women's Writing Guild's anthology Heels into the Soil: Stories and Poems Resisting the Silence and elsewhere. You can find her posting cat pictures on Twitter @elisacwrites or check out her website at elisarowe.com