Mother: preface me with only. This memory of yours
is cannonplay. Don’t let it touch me.

Terra: somewhere silent you are a wide soil
done over in ash and plenty.

Lover: under flowers now it is not a face
holding onto you. Under your name there is not
a voice or a quiet to cling to.

Mother: you could treat us secretly.
You could bury my name as a pearl or a ring.

Branches: somewhere your forest is permanent,
a shadow burned on the city buildings, a shadow
to which you must turn. All season the white petals
break your intent and drift into pop songs.

Terra: you are the last background
I ever made.

Mother: it is what you think.

Mother: it is a vision by distance.
We are far from the shapes we claim.

Window: on either side of you we are marking desire
with the oil of our hands. In a glare we insist
on the glass between us, though for days now
the world seems clear enough to walk through.

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This poem came out of a trouble with what we accumulate behind the way things are. It was written to be read behind a playhouse in Joe Wenderoth's backyard.