In A Canadian Novelist's Kitchen

She's the softer sort
this older woman moves
from sink to table
back again
washing fruit.
She's cutting bread -
thick slices with a sharp knife

All the time she's talking
"What will you do?"
"Language is a playground."
"Believe and do it for yourself."
reaches into the cooler
for cheese.
"This is my own soup,"
she says.

I am seeing how I want
to be.
Her calm, her bookshelves
her short white hair
and him in the background
a gentle man
passing with a saw
but looking like
he shouldn't be holding it.