A Slipping Between Seasons
Bowl or wicker basket—
sense might empty, or stay,
mine. Pecans, matchbooks,
the stuff of casual capture,
canopy or steakhouse,
cigarette machines, doorknob
stalks dumping stale packs
to stick and coins, always
the last, chattering blind
into a tin cup. Tell me
I should’ve known. I’d erase
the long backstory,
fingertip riding the lines.
My best trick’s disappearance,
someone said, so I changed
the names: thorn to thimble:
stockingcap, mime.
Nighthours I force my arms
like stems by my stitched sides,
and smoke interrupts the clouds,
coverup, none too elaborate
for what psychologists call the will
to be caught. Well, I tried that,
rifling trashbins for simulacrum,
or pills. Then, vividly, the sky
one second past gray noon,
a stunt flyer loop-de-looping,
the pasture nobody swore by;
and the yearling colts
traipsing my straight line
slow: fill me like that, upside-
downsy coffee cup, shimmering
pears, still life worth living,
despite debris, and listening
to whispers that strike up
loud and fade till what remains
is ringing, force of thickened
blood and disappointment,
matched twins: the sky’s cold
comfort answers west, bright
before late colors I can’t predict
but might guess, an old story,
good idea. All right, I’m staying.
I’m staying here. And facing
into the spaces I haven’t filled.
Dense as stain between thin walls,
or the snapped twigs I can’t reach
breaking the shape of the Indian
dogwood, I make my claim
like a star that only seems to fall
if you believe the earth, smudged
as a banjo, is all there is.