Polishing silver earrings I recall
women who gave them to me
over years quivering like a heat mirage
barely visible at this distance.
No precious stones or gold,
no fortunes spent to please a magpie.
I have always been content

with silver in inventive shapes,
just silver that requires attention.
Touch it with the hands
remove the tarnish with
tiny rubbed circles.
Use a special cloth, so old
and full of tarnish smudge—

minuscule molecules of spent silver,
exposed to air and darkened
silently when I wasn’t looking
not paying attention.

I look for the women in the cloth—

but they are smudges in history
left to darken or die
or fade from the brilliance
that sent silver my way,

then lost it’s luster when
I wasn’t paying attention.