POETRY

Begets and Destroys

Recognition was the cruelest gift I ever gave

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I am the one
who begets and destroys
I have known this the way a tide knows
the shore is only borrowed

I gathered you from dust
that never asked to be gathered
and called it morning
because I needed a word to stand in the doorway

I pressed my mouth to something
with no name yet
gave it lungs before I understood
what breath was for

Tender is what a wildfire feels like
to the seed, it cracks open
smoke and green
still arguing in my hands

I built a house of ribs and hung a heart in the window
like a lamp
even then I knew the lamp
would gutter

I held a small country in my palm
and taught it to sing
the singing outlived
my hands