poetry thursday

this week's theme was to work on a cliche. i chose "take a walk in the other man's shoes" and used it to sort through my grief for a mother who was murdered in her new orleans home january fourth.

helen hill

with the news of your death
my compassion dissolved
into a thin membrane
translucent and vulnerable
i felt around my heart
for your murderer's shoes
so i could slip them on
in the darkness i could not
make out the color or size
but i can tell you, dear helen,
that hours after francis became
a motherless child,
the shoes remain warm