Raised to live in the expectation of angels, speaking trees, sinkholes, and suffering,
I plummet on a tenuous threshold only one dog’s bark from holy instruction
or a paramedic’s bag landing in the hallway. And yet compelled irreparably to love,
I put my breath onto the mirror, and toast the ground as much as the snow:
this is life at the top, I know. I know. To have survived this far. To have gotten
away with myself and wept into a clearing. There was a chance that a bird took
instead of a boy. That was what happened in my case. And in my case, I was the bird.…
You're reading a preview of
The Nation (Digital) - 1 Issue, June 2024