Feather

was it⁠ ⁠…
did it sing
did we know the tune already

could you hear it from over there
the laughter
does it seem like it happened
so quickly
does it seem like it’s
still happening

your mouth in the air, sipping the sky
body of water, mine in yours
did you think it was love
did you really

mother said, keep for yourself a secret
hold at least one thing
against your chest, keep it hidden and yours
far from him

souvenir
(mother said a lot of things)

do you know the clouds
are they wonderful

or bloated bruised
violence everywhere

but you get it
honey-like
running and sticking

boomerang

a crow fed
far too much
by the neighbor

was it luxurious
was it kind
can you still
taste it and was it rich
was it good
did you cum

boomerang

it still feels inevitable
all my returning

in my dream
there was a brushfire
did it get you
did it get you
did it get you

Soil

I’ve built something of a life in your absence,
and it has hurt me, learning
to bathe a new body, but

I’ve begged the water enough
to scrub me clean of sorrow, and
someone suggested I just keep it.

So, there’s a gift here: I can still love
the burning house in my memory; I can
warm my hands against the fire and thank it

for the heat. To love my suffering is to love,
that devotion eternal: surviving
on Thomas Lane with our beat up

station wagon that smelled like cigarettes
and three paychecks; in the bathtub,
my peach fuzz and your blade

in the eighth grade; in the cremation office,
me and Audrey and your sister
with all those papers and pens,

acknowledgements and praise.
All of this to say: I will keep it.
Detritus has anti-aging properties,

that’s what they’re saying, so
let it heal my wounds, make me naïve
and bright and ready and real,

like that buttercup under your chin
in the tall grass of my youth:
gold as ever.

Peaks of Otter

I stand on the very edge
of the very edge, at the other side of
curiosity’s twine, connected to the dirt,
searching the earth with eyes given
from love to love, that breath stroke.
I spot tiny houses, their bite-sized people
and their bite-sized lives, trinkets on the mantel, the dog
in the yard, and even further, their laughter.
All of it there, away from my meddling. I find
myself in awe, not of it opening so unknowingly, so
gracefully before me, but in realizing
my time will end before
I ever get to touch it all.