Crab Orchard Review Vol. 12, No. 2, our

Christopher Matthews
Christmas Postage Stamp
Reduction has made it
a wonder of precision: mother & child
the size of a microchip
exact enough to smuggle on the tongue.
Giotto’s Madonna’s
monumental hands—jointless, immobile, robust,
hypnotist hands
teasing out will through the eyes—don’t grip: they keep,
they weld to their orbit
the child & imitation laurel branch
through some invisible
magnetic demand the high voltage master switch
of which is her smile.
Meanwhile, the boy, brand new old man, held out
like a hand grenade,
grabs a miraculous finger & aims it
at the branch & the
textbook little leaf he reaches out to pinch
as though to demonstrate
how to lift the hem of a skirt, or squeeze
the flame from a wick.
Behind them looms a golden gong
Crab Orchard Review ◆ 147