Rummy Park, 29
(Let’s Be Friends)

Rebecca Lu Kiernan

In spite of hearts that drum and skip,
Uncharted stars that fall
Gracelessly with a blinding light
That would have cried out for a name,
Or at least a number,
(Here comes XC319.)
In spite of this
Grief, with surgically precise fingers
Stitches up lives
Picassoesque, perhaps,
But in some practical form
That keeps us
Walking through necessary doors.

At times, those jagged seams
Which feel so sturdy in the work bread minute,
Shrink in the threat of moonlight,
Unravel in the most forbidden of dreams
And I think we could exchange a few words
Without anything in the house breaking.

Ah, in these lavender hours
I think there’s still a house
And flesh to entertain
And a grey dog that waits
Whineless,
Inextinguishable in the rain.