Limbs with fingers
Limbs with leaves
The limbs of the next door birch
Bone white and thin
Reach into the wind of spring’s cold clear
Blue sky, next to the smear of clouds
The wind is moving along.
I look there when I
Cannot look at you. Sullen and bent
Over your chest, arms folded like a stern master.
Head tilted and eyes turned at me unblinking.
I think of cut apples and the smell of tea.
I think of a picture of a flower from the booth at the market
I think of anything but your frozen posture
Stuck there from the wrecking I do
Till you are a ghost of a building
I used to live inside.
Limbs with fingers
Fold around themselves against your trunk
While I, and my own fingers train the hem of the pillow out
I hold it tight against me,
stare out the long window at the new season
Full of reaching limbs and angles, wind and sun.
