I WISH I COULD QUILT AS ANY OF MY MATRIARCHS DO

by Kayleb Rae Candrilli

Each May is hotter

than the last. Pollen folds

itself over

the back roads

like a blanket, and I can’t help

but recall the quilts of my great

grandmothers, of their daughters

and their daughter’s

daughters—each stitch

tighter than the last.

At my mother’s camper,

the wind through the poplar trees

chimes like coins in my pocket.

My mother starts a fire

with lighter fluid and says: Spotify

changed my life. We listen

to reggae and confuse

the first streaks of meteors

for mating fireflies.

This world has been so cruel

to my mother and yet

she can still see

the meteors for the shower

they are—baptismal—

and she is always willing

to be reborn.

---

Kayleb Rae Candrilli is the recipient of a Whiting Award, a PEW fellowship, and of a fellowship from the National Endowment of the Arts. They are the author of  Winter of Worship,  Water I Won’t Touch,  All the Gay Saints, and  What Runs Over. Candrilli lives in Philadelphia with their partner. You can read more of their work  here.