TIGHTENING SKATES

Brock Dethier

I gouge my numb index fingers 

under the stiff laces,

pry for leverage, 

the tiniest bit of slack,

jerk it through,

knuckle the gain in place

up sixty pairs of eyelets,

Corey's, then Larkin's, then Tanner's,

lower back scar bulging,

knees wet from kneeling,

jacket flecked with frozen spray

kicked by kids' skates,

and thank my mother

in her ancient, thin parka, 

kneeling beside her mitten shells,

tightening the first to get laced,

the butt of each skate denting her thigh, 

hands blotched redwhite from cold,

hoping her fingers will still obey

and lace her own, 

give her a moment of grace to glide

before the first one gets cold ears

or needs retightening.

Published in the collection, Reclamation (Popcorn Press, 2015).  

I imagine most parents can relate to the kind of moment I capture in “Tightening Skates”: doing something for your kids makes you suddenly appreciate what your parents did for you when you were a kid. I don’t think I planned what’s now my favorite part of that poem—that it allows the mother briefly to glide away, free, something she had trouble doing in real life.