A Son

-- meant the door opening a draft

entering the afternoon room.

And everyone else sleeping

with their mouths open their legs.

Or if you were my father the doctor

you would be outside in the world

touching other people’s bodies opening,

holding a stick into a woman

who could not swallow for days

without it hurting. It being

the edge of her throat her voice

loose commands or the end of her mouth

the base of her tongue its root—

End of the day and a swift

pen-light, or something

mumbled from the other

side of the desk: to get dressed

because it was clear what was wrong.

Button into its hole. And a pill

into the long funnel of the body.

-- meant we had such faith in science.

meant I was partly his because I was half

his making, half his wish.

Part of the bad dream he could not wake up from

when he was young, in an old afternoon.

Sleeping the well outside his house opening

its secret mouth, deep into the world

where he knew fish were moving,

the earth shifting its feet his son

of many suns of many years

to come was making

his mind move the wind.