This is how it happened: associatively
and with feeling. In the trees, I crouched,
adhering, quick. There was a bucket, so I
kicked it, took a wicked licking at stopgap.
My stance steadlong and headfast, I was
asked to leave — make my takeaway and say
hell no to the hedge. They never forgave the
broken plate I refused. No longer their baby,
from then on I was B. Somewhere,
anywhere else. No risk for the watered, no
wear for the warned. Instead of listening,
I lessened and lessened, then nothing was left.
Nothing to identify or inside me out. Just a
bright and liquid surface with no edge —
infinity pool tricked out with a system of
interlocking sparks. What we tuck away we
plug away at in the dark. The clock strikes
none, the glass won’t run, interior bonded,
bronzed.


Amaranth Borsuk is our Poet in Residence for April.

Previously: STRAP ON A WITNESS WHEN YOU GO OUT WITH THE TONGUE IN YOUR MOUTH WORN THIN FROM WALKING, and IT GOES WITHOUT SAYING, a collaboration with Julie Wills.