Limelight

Limelight

for Sarah Dunnam Lewis, 1855-1924


This lamp is a woman.
The chimney's seductive curve,
the floral lip, its symmetry is yours.
You sponged black soot,
replaced the wick, like walking
tightrope in your sleep.

Brood brought down the house,
but never you, never the lamp.
She faired a sideshow century
without a chip, crated-up
in steam engines and horse carts,
Burnt Corn to New Mexico,

till a deep-snow Hoosier night,
the undertaker raised her
over your face,
for one last applause.
He did not grope
the hand-painted porcelain,
but balanced her in his palm,
like a juggler.

Tess Kincaid

Tess wrote later, "My grandfather told me he remembered as a little boy seeing the undertaker, who came to the farm that winter night, balance the lamp in the palm of his hand, as he lighted her face, for the approval of the family."

Posted over on Life at Willow Manor
The premiere poem over on Magpie Tales 34