From Correspondent. Published by Icehouse Poetry in 2018.
My mother, at fourteen, swims for hours before school every day. Her palms cup water, wrapped in bracelets of silver bubbles, rosaries of air. She breathes to the rhythm of morning prayer. Je vous salue Marie, pleine de grâce. A kick on Marie, a breath on grâce. Clockwork. Outside, nuns circle the pool in their black habits. Hands behind their backs, the white clouds of their voices. Snow falling on Quebec City’s copper roofs. A bell ringing. When she swims the backstroke, my mother balances a cold glass of water on her forehead. To learn to keep still. To learn not to shake when she runs out of breath, when breath runs out of her. The glass throws a ring of light across her freckled face. If it falls into the water, the clock will stop, go back to zero. Pressure is increasing in the compartment. My father, at fourteen, boards a Russian cargo ship in the port of Saint John, New Brunswick. The captain shakes his hand and pulls him and his friend on board for a tour, tourists in their own home. A strange country of steel floating in familiar waters. The hold bursting with sacks of gold wheat. My father and the captain talk in broken English, talk in circles. Russian men look up from their meals, spoons frozen in air. They wave hello. The captain points at valves and dials, saying words in Russian. A needle points to rain on the face of a barometer. The captain knocks on the metal wall, says strong, rolling the R. Back on the open deck, he hands my father a blue and white grammar book. On the drive home, it lies closed in his lap. He runs his hand over the rough cover, imagines the secrets trapped inside. someone will read this.
