MARISA CAPPETTA

 

my mum works like a man

 

Slight as a mollusk mum carries out tasks with a stocky precision that erodes mountain
ranges. Preoccupied with the excavation of grief her sister resents mum’s wood piled against
the house in its orderly, chopped stacks. Mum follows a fault line to her desert refuge and into
the walls of her mud house scratches the days since sister was widowed. She plans to return
to town after the post funeral fete, a ritual boiling of sauerkraut, wedding photos and
reputations. Mum outlived her man but is no widow. She is a snail carrying her home on the
dry bed of an ancient inland sea.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Marisa Cappetta graduated suma cum laude from the Hagley Writers’ Institute and received a mentorship from the NZSA. Her published work includes New Zealand and international journals, anthologies, and How to Tour the World on a Flying Fox by Steele Roberts. She has completed a second collection, Windows Below the Waterline.