Matt Witt, Decaying Wood, 2016 (Artist Website)
Photograph
My sister and I kept it in secret,
stowed away to hide from the visitors from home.
The black box from Cost Plus, the lid painted
with gentlemen of Old Asia, a river of red and gold.
In space we learned to hold onto
these things of Earth: the roach clip and the pipes
kept quiet by soft cloths and baggies in the box
so beautiful the visitors would never think
to search it. It was my sister’s strange dowry,
what she brought to our marriage in the void.
Black box with the tin lid flat, overturned
while she cleaned the dope, crushed it in her fingers,
shook it in the tin so the seeds rolled out (that later
sprouted spindly plants in my closet with the growlight).
This gift of magic she brought, even a little glass
hash pipe tucked in there, spare lighters—she thought
of everything and kept it all sacred in the box
that she opened on the altar of the coffee table.