My Mother’s Mink

A poem by Yuri Kageyama

my mother’s mink

sleeps in a drawer

so silken soft;

she longed for it

like her jewels,

a bit of an embarrassment;

the Marilyn Monroe generation,

she went to college, spoke English

my mother’s mink

silent like a corpse,

all the fuzzy rodents,

womb cradling fetus;

once there was life;

I can’t get myself to

throw it out  

but I will never wear it