From Eva Sounness: Keeping Her Mouth Shut

From Eva Sounness: Keeping Her Mouth Shut

From Eva Sounness: Keeping Her Mouth Shut

It is an act
Eva becomes practiced in—
pressing her lips together,
clamping her teeth down on words
that rise from her belly like bile:
Stop telling me what to do and
Mind your own business
She becomes adept at moulding her mouth
into innocuous smiles—
the proper response to her mother-in-law
who lifts an eyebrow to say:
You haven’t polished the silver
and frowns, to remind her:
You’re not a farmer’s daughter.

No, not a farmer’s daughter.
Eva lifts her head to the window
scanning the dark line of trees against the horizon,
this could be hostile country,
the orchards sinister with the drop of fruit,
the rippling stretches of field concealing fences,
the trembling fault-lines of ownership, belonging, property.
Propriety. Eva arches her eyebrows in return,
swivels her elbows, puts on her most polite
and mocking smile
and slowly pours some tea.