Blur

(OvO), "The trees have eyes and they've
gathered to watch our fleeting lives," 2013

My gaze, beloved, doesn’t hold fast any longer. It
flickers like a hummingbird’s tongue, nystagmus
kissing the snowdrops as I bend to look close, so
close extra gravity tugs at me, softens the ground
underfoot. I catch myself, widen my stance but it’s
too late, I’m set down in mulch and mud, breathing
in what the wood chips exhale—lignin, resin, vanillin,
my nose in the book of shredded trees. It’s a blur,
this life, rising on the wind, falling at moonset, and
I still look to touch it mid-flight, to steady my gaze.