Sock Quilt

Sock Quilt

These you left:
mateless tube socks,
argyles the colors
of wild birds.
I thread them by hand,
ankle to toe, my stitches
are volumes leaning
between ends.

There is no order
to this piecing:
your castoffs, mine,
good enough
for this one thing.
A man who doesn¹t
question origins
plays music in my room.
This also seems enough,
fingers touching wound metal,
the tentative voice.

In Missoula I met a man
in a bookstore and we talked
about owls. Later
he sent a poem
about a woman, white pages,
the slap of wings
through night air. We are all trying
to make something
out of nothing.