In the Studio
by Anna Suszynski
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If you need mom, she’ll be in her studio. If you need mom, she’s pulling a coil from the extruder. She’s scraping the form. She’s pushing aside ten-pound bags of Custer Feldspar in her chemical cabinet. If you need mom, she’s lost in the music, her arm elbow deep in a bucket of molding slip. She’s a disciple of the mold; the bell lichen has its own atmosphere. If you need mom, she’s got her head in the kiln, arranging her porcelain-dipped plant matter. She’s getting pricked by the dried sea holly; it leaves pretty painted bruises on her hip. She’s never mopping the floor, she leaves that to me. If you need mom, she’s pulling old bird nests from the rafters and pointing one of my tall brothers to the places she can’t reach. If you need mom, which is often, let her finish her work first, then ask. She’s rolling slabs and asking me to help her move them to the table. She never cleans the table, she leaves that to me. She’s saving the wrinkled slab ends; they look like skin. She’s hunched over the sink washing the glaze from her brushes, washing the vinegar water from the dental tools. She’s shoving aside frit and hauling soda ash. If you need mom, she’s on a walk looking for thistles. She’s out in the dried-up marshes hunting for spindly combs. If you need mom, she’s on the canal, walking home like a peacock, all the dead thistles in a plume behind her. If you need mom, she’s back in the studio, with the person-sized whisk, stirring away. If you need mom, she’s at Rock Leaf in Denver, looking for magnetite and manganese dioxide 200 mesh. If you need mom, she’s at the kitchen warehouse store buying an industrial-sized mixing bowl. She’s trucking everything home, calling me on her way. If you need mom, she’s following the curve of another head the size of her palm. She’s stacking the heads like a shipwreck in the corner. She’s leaving the six-foot tall female figures behind and turning toward installation. She’s brushing past the dry XX sagger, saying that was a different time, burnishing clay is in the past. She’s melting glass, she’s melting everything, she’s a scientist. If you need mom, she’ll look up from one of her swivel stools and check your face. She’ll walk over to the sink that’s a mess because I haven’t cleaned it in a while, and she’ll dry her hands on her apron that has years of clay caked onto it. She’ll follow you out into the hallway and help you with what you need. She’ll make dinner only if you’ll help, and she’ll get mad if anyone expects her to. If you need mom, always look in the studio first, and if not in the studio, crouching outside near the lavender and the ice plants, the vizslas at her heels. She’ll be there with her horsehair trailing her stride, a mane of black hair streaked with pure silver. She’ll be checking the bougainvillea, the goldfish, the Japanese maple, tying down the tarp on the skateboard ramp, looking for coyote tracks, taking photos of the baby owls in the willow, expecting the creek to finally run dry. If you need mom, she’ll help, and I’ll help her, too. If you need me, find me at my desk writing this down, or outside trailing the rusty dog tails trailing my mom.
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Anna Suszynski holds a BA in English, Creative Writing from Colorado College and an MFA in writing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She received second place for the Adelaide Bender Reville Prize for short fiction, was a finalist in the F(r)iction Spring Contest and a finalist for the Glimmer Train New Writers Award. She is currently at work on a family memoir.
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