Forbearance is the Long Suit of the Matriarchs


 
 

But I have taken off all my clothes
and am lean as a strawberry and knots couched in a teachable moment.

 

For Christ to take up residence, your plate must stay full. 

 

I ate my food. I drank my juice. I rinsed my dishes.

 

Sometimes all the men go out into the weather until all the roads are impassible and
limbs fall off from exposure. 

 

Long suffering is the flood of the matriarchs.

 

The matriarchs are mighty to save. 

 

The matriarchs are miserable and mad.

 

Our compassion is in rocks as ore is in rocks. 

 

One wants space from the matriarchs,
                        where space is actually    death.

 

This is the grace of sacrifice! 

 

When can the matriarchs feel good    about  grace?

 

Pity the self. 

 

At least we have named our stories “fear” and “isolation.”

 

Jesus who loves you needs you to eat this, or you will be punished the most. 

 

You’ll wait.

 

We will wait. 
 
 
 

Kate Murr is a recent graduate of the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. She grew up on Main Street in a rural southwest Missouri town and teaches as a working artist in rural schools and at the Art Museum in Springfield, Missouri. Her chapbook about Bald Knobbers, the devil, and art was selected among the finalists for last year's Sunken Garden contest at Tupelo Press. Her work appears in anthologies from Pencil Box Press and FootHills Press.