To The New Year
You burst from the starting gate
and though I pull on the reins,
I hang on for the ride,
longing for 1940's snail-pace years
when I wanted to be older, faster, sooner.
Now you race through weeks and months,
rushing to your demise. Do you ever
think of jumping fences,
lying in green pastures,
letting me slip from the saddle
to the spacious terrain of silence
where I can breathe
reflections about my life,
feel the texture of grass,
and gaze into your tender eyes?
Department Store Elevator, 1946
"Going up," a woman calls.
I hold my mother's hand.
We crowd to the back
and turn around, ready
to get out of this box.
Squished between coats,
I'm face to face with
a dead fox dangling
over a lady's shoulder.
I stare into his yellow
glass eyes, touch his nose,
and hold his paw claws.
I stroke his fur and think
the owner must love her fox:
she takes him everywhere.
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Galaxy z8_GND_5296
The test tube name
for this farthest found galaxy
captures my curiosity.
Scientists spin fact webs —
they view z8 as it was
13 billion years ago,
only 700 million after
the Big Bang,
a theory that rivals
God and seven days.
As I try to picture
the birth of the universe,
galaxies and earth, my brain
bolts into orbit and propels
my grey matter down black holes,
sending me outside to stand
on grass, inhale the sun's heat,
see a crow cross the blue sky, and
gather guavas that fell in the night.
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