Public Republic

Simon Perchik

Photo: Clearly Ambiguous

And forgetting too comes easier
bending the Earth the way the old
learn to see in the dark –I lose count

to begin again, finger by empty finger
touching my lips, expecting
more silence though the baby
has no room to make an arch, to feel
the wind under one foot then the other

–it’s the mother’s caution
–just enough wood –air currents
are dangerous everywhere
and a few flowers placed at the feet
the way an arrow is balanced
for gusts and the slim box
bending from some ancient pull
even wood has somehow forgotten.

I limp with both feet now, two canes
helping me remember if I too
was once a tree or a vague long ago
slowly, quietly, lifted where the dirt
stays soft –who can be sure
now that the sky has been opened
and every step sounds like a small lid.