Sylvie Unravel
I’m making a blanket. I’m telling myself
I’ll give it as a gift even though deep down
I know it’s for me. I don’t know how
to make a blanket for me. I’m making a blanket
while my podcast plays low through
the wireless speaker and this boy
is under my duvet (lilac, toile), snoring.
Just a little. Just the suggestion
of a snore. I’m making a blanket
and I’m studying him like
an exponential function. Stranger
in my bed. Would be terrifying except
with that arm he couldn’t hurt me
if he wanted to. I don’t think he does, gentle
Winslow snoozing with his head on his chest.
Knox has the kind of tan my stepdad
pays money to have sprayed on, a tan
that makes me think about fishing
from a canoe, or making your own
granola. It makes me think about summer,
the summer I imagined for myself
before the accident. I’m making a blanket
and telling myself it’s nothing like
the one I made for Cal,
the one his parents wouldn’t let me
put in his casket.