flail, snap, struggle,
flail, snap, struggle,
strangle, some eaten out by an infestation
(the devastation of dominant manifestation).
One summer, it was cicadas.
Trunks pregnant with moles & voles,
shelter-seekers making nests—we’ve spotted swallows,
blue jays, back & forth of robins in idle conversation,
incessant nuisance of woodpeckers—
symphonic throbbing of hundreds of thousands
of insects humming
in brilliant orchestration—watched the nipples
of buds take hold in spring,
shiver in the wind, each leaf, as if to bloom
in spontaneous simulation,
mourned the foliage’s decolorization,
curl of leaf before deportation, fallen
leaves, stacked in piles like skeletons
of the dead, under shade & shadow, witnessed
disturbance & succession & as if by the miraculous hand
of a force unknown, tyrannical, victorious, small pines
nearing extinction, through slaughter, no taller
than a toddler, push themselves up & take hold.
Those Long Afternoons
During the blackout, we were alone in our house surrounded by woods (his father was working in the city). No phone, no access, not even a radio or batteries for flashlights.
Because we wanted him to have faith, not because we wanted to be separate, but because we had to be watchful of who we were, we schooled him in the language of our ancestors & so when darkness descended & he grew afraid, we gathered all the candles. I told him the story of Moses in the wilderness & how there was a miracle & the light was everlasting. It is a metaphor, I said & we waited & eventually we had light.
