The Bride’s Boots

Jeannie Inkster, Rousay 1915

by Lydia Harris

How rivets and brads find their home,
laces criss-cross the tongue,
18 eyelets climb to the cuff.

Her ankles are keys in silk locks.
She shifts on the fan of tacks
tapped in on the old man’s triple last.

The whiff of the crust of wax
left in the tin, in her nose.
Carbon black.

Buffed to a shine.
They’re those rocks on the Taing
when the tide’s pulled back.