to what does your small, hot body attune itself?
in which direction do you find the wind?
or does the wind find you? inanimate, still
waiting to be graced with breath before movement
on which of the small birds does your eye fall
on this cool morning, which will blossom slowly
into a day on the brink of springtime proper
or do you regard the ever-preening, iridescent ducks
a staple of this landscape, but never a friend
turned as they always are towards their magnetic
home —a calling you surely cannot help but envy
you, who are so pulled by multiples, by fragments
do you stop, eyes closed, to look at the only thing
shut eyes can still grasp totally: the sun
home at last from her sabbatical southward
or wherever it is she goes when winter comes
and do you let her fill the cavern behind your eyes
with red-hot danger just a moment before continuing
down the path of your day or life wherever it may lead?
and when you regard the blank page do you also
regard the tree it once was, and the table
it rests on, a tree once too, which is dusted
by someone to whom a library is north, the way the ducks
have their warmth and the sun its sky, and you
your home, can you name it? and is it fixed?
or are you home amongst the objects you can grasp
with a thrumming need for momentary stasis
the notebook, table, library, the coffee cup
touched by hands before yours and after
even the woman who made it, though you do not
know her name, are these assurances of your existence
home enough, for now, in days that fly like ducks
but faster, and a mind as turgid as gray skies
and fickle as cajoling springtime winds, do these
the objects of your dutied, careful positioning
feel enough like home to orient your north
or do you reach with your blind body for something
like the sun, you cannot look at, only feel
like the child by the pond who disregards the ducks
to chase the wind
Claudia Maurino, ’24