‘Middlemarch in the Kitchen’: a poem by Claire Potter
The following poem is from Acanthus by Claire Potter, a collection published in 2022.
Middlemarch in the Kitchen
Winter begins at three. Blue flakes of light
dissolve from the texture of moss-stitch into
the porosity of tulle, become so meagre they
barely cover anything at all. I’m reading a
book in the lighted kitchen, instead of the grass
and the trees, the objects I turn my back on are
before me in the window. I put my book down,
my hand catches a splinter. The paper nautilus,
tight-lipped on the shelf, is mirrored in the dark
window. Ornaments of ivy curl outside. Unlike
other surfaces, love becomes planetary with
distance and in the looking glass I become a
night-moth across your thigh
