Lucky Jefferson

We've been there

the silence of reeds

all around us

The scientist felt a pronounced need for something whole that used to be green

it is humans who nurture flowers with blade hands

pitted, laying long like a twig. And I think of God, of all things

She was only skin and bone,
and could not even swallow rice porridge

A crow breaks from the oak
canopy

I had listened to their Romani ćhib and coded slang from the borrowed van we’d made a home.

when I was a boy          the side of a cardboard box
said my future daughter’s heart would be
the same             shape as the little bouquet of her fist

“pay attention! look about!
all this precious plenitude
is headed for the drain.”

All we seem to grow are twigs!
They need sun.
Of course, they need sun.