“You go upstairs and read.”

I know a bookish woman who recedes
into corners where she’s hard to find.
Places veiled from view are home to her:
alcoves, crannies, recessed places, houses
curtained, draped, screened and gated.
Shaded from outside eyes she is at ease,
cares for herself, her house, her things,
and writes and reads. A city brownstone
cast her in its shadow, high and narrow.
With the inklings she gleans from pages,
she lives, not seeing too much from side
to side. No more ordinary than grass
intent on making a meadow, she guesses
it is her school-teacher mother’s doing
who after dinner each day would say,
“You go upstairs and read.” In other words,
“Fly to your eyrie, your nest above below,
your upstairs separate third-floor room.
Eagles will dip their wings to you.”