Worn

Lost Sock

It wasn’t just any sock
Like in the interchangeable thinning black
Streams of knitted store-brand wool
Your skin shows through
Like veins in the hand of a very old uncle, veins that,
If they could speak, could weave such stories
Of blood rushing, escaping
Through undarned lapses, gaps
Measured not in reams
But in years.

These were French socks and
Like France small and sly and
Clustered in places
So you could get a toe in but
On your first visit perhaps
Not a whole foot
But which we kept trying on again
Because, well, it’s French.

But it’s years later,
Their connection to events blurred,
She who bought them, helped them on and off,
Washed and separated them, now pretends she never knew
They were French, that they’re not interchangeable,
That they could speak;
It’s, just: One’s lost, good riddance,
And: Didn’t those used to
Belong to me?