The Noodle Maker’s Shop

by Karina Borowicz

Guanzhang, China

Everything is covered
by the fine dust of flour
the walls aged by it

scoured by tiny grains
the small window
no longer transparent

a passerby can make out only
the bare bulb’s cold glow
bleaching the room
like the hollow of a salt mine

and the repetitive movements
of a blurred shadow
digging its way out

 

Karina Borowicz has recent work in Bellevue Literary Review, American Letters & Commentary, and The Southern Review.  She lives in western Massachusetts. (1/2010)