Squalor of leaves. November. A lone
hornets' nest. Paper wasps. Place where
everything that happens is as who says it will,
because. As in Why shouldn't we have
come to this, why not, this far, this
close to
that below-zero where we almost
forget ourselves, rise at last unastonished
at the wreckery of it, what the wreckage
somedays can seem all along to have
been mostly, making you wonder what fear
is for, what prayer is, if not the first word
and not the last one either, if it changes
nothing of what you are still, black stars,
black
scars, crossing a field that you've
crossed before, holding on, tight, though
careful, for you must be careful, so easily
torn is the veil diminishment comes
down to as it lifts and falls, see it falling,
now it lifts again, why do we love, at all?
Copyright © 2013 by Carl Phillips
