Barbara Crooker: “Pinched Nerve”
PINCHED NERVE
When the pain stops drilling its jackhammer
into my right hipbone, retreats for a while
like a wave sucking back from the shore,
the afternoon settles back in its place,
sunlight tossing handfuls of gold through
the tendrils of the grape arbor, the broad-leaved
fig trees, the pomegranates. The only sound:
one creaking rooster and the far-off murmurings
of birds, the language of silence. Let me stay here
in this wrought-iron chair. Back home, the news
is apocalyptic: earthquakes, hurricanes, mad men
threatening the unspeakable. But for right now,
as the pain subsides, the crust on this quiche
could make angels sing, and the pink-gray rosé
is like drinking Provençe. Raise a glass
to this sunlight splashing everywhere! I think
I am going to sit here forever; I think
I will never grow old.
Barbara Crooker is the author of eight books of poetry. Les Fauves (C&R Press, 2017) is the most recent. She has received several awards, including the WB Yeats Society of New York Award, the Thomas Merton Poetry of the Sacred Award, and three Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Creative Writing Fellowships.