Bread of Haste

crumbling the bread of haste
into a bowl of vegetable soup

she does not think of forty
long years--or even forty days--

but of the forty-eight hours
before calm comes to rest,

blue upon her shoulders, like a
old friend or lover, the

touch familiar, light as a
scarf rounding her neck, the

stretch of silence, silk-glimmering,
held, only for a moment

between her teeth