9 AM

Translated by Rawley Grau

The morning multiplies like the chicks in the coop behind the house. The impatient light searches for the breach point—the sauntering sunbeams turn it around, into premonition. Day besieges us on every side, but we are safe from the intruder: a cool net of shadows stretches beneath our fingers. Tweedy coquetry, cottony calm, silky shimmers, and the long, tireless snip of the noisy shears, which know how to stop at the end of the journey. Buttons in lively disarray and the thinnest of barely visible threads—creating things is safe; it doesn’t make you leave the room. Or leave yourself. Samples of fabric flow across the furniture in waves and let themselves be pricked where it hurts the most. Amid this willing victim, we scoff at beauty; work will be our amble through the day. In the abundance of attention, words are beside the point. The thick silence is a long and sumptuous gown in which I move with remarkable skill and no fear of falling. Nimbly we step, as if one through the other, and waste no time on digressions. The heavy credenza shakes out its treasures at our processions. When I place my hands on it, it too settles down.

 

Published by Talisman: A Journal of Contemporary Poetry and Poetic