When winemakers use the thief,
the long pipette to withdraw liquid
from the cask or carboy,
it looks like a violation,
as if they’re performing
exploratory surgery
trying to determine
the state of what’s inside.
Perhaps that’s why
it has such a name,
an acknowledgement
of transgression
but also a suggestion
that the wine no longer
belongs to its makers.
I think of the lost expressions
on painter’s faces
after they sell canvases
they have worked on for months
or parents at airports in August
whose children have chosen
schools hundreds of miles away.
The winemaker’s tool serves
as a constant reminder:
what we make is not ours,
some day our rooms will be empty,
love makes thieves of us all. |
