a cento
between youth and whatever’s up next
the river is moving
Nobody sees me running toward the sun
her hands are cold. What time is it?
sweet clot of wakefulness, what is mercy?
A pony on the balcony!
a man who swam in his house three days
with God banging on the door like the police
At eight I was brilliant with my body
My mother had two faces and a frying pot
how embarrassing is love
Isn’t it wrong, the way the mind moves back.
Will grief and loss swamp us?
I am trying, I think, to forgive myself
but in the geometry of my mind
I’m at a double wake
discussing politics with an unemployed butterfly
the musk of rotten apples everywhere
I don’t know what pain is, do you know what pain is?
Can beauty save us? Yesterday
echoes from the handball courts nearby
What was incomprehensible will be comprehended
forget the world’s smallness. I’m tired
Sources: Craig Morgan Teicher, Wallace Stevens, Patricia Smith, Philip Levine, Fady Joudah, Ilya Kaminsky, Andy Young, James Nolan, Gary Soto, Audre Lorde, Cornelius Eady, Richard Hugo, Kyle Dargan, Harmony Holiday, Maggie Nelson, Ross Gay, Dave Brinks, Tim Dlugos, Bob Kaufman, Alan Chong Lau, John Murillo, Czesław Miłosz, and Justin Phillip Reed