When you close the door       when you leave   at 7:26        I wonder    I wonder    where                  you go 

Bless you, my peach, thank you for waiting.

I know you miss those juicy sunbeams

dripping through your velvet hair. 

we’ll be stunned for an eternity or two, going

damn, I guess Joseph Smith was a prophet and we really did need to spend those Saturdays getting baptized for dead people and the garden of Eden was in Jackson County Missouri

You tell me to bring a bathing suit cause you’ve got a pool now, and you do, only it’s the blow-up kind, big enough for two, which works cause it’s just you and me. We both hold our cocktails steady—which aren’t really cocktails cause they don’t sell lime and mint at the liquor store—and swing one leg over into the pool, then the next.

I’ll pitch the shaggy dough right there on the field, stab my shovel in deep to scoop and turn, knead the great globby mess until it’s smooth. We’ll cover it with the circus tent—bright red and gold stripes—smell the yeast working its magic, watch it rise in the midday sun.

MotherFather’s boots squish squelch. Squish squelch through the mud. Squish squelch through the bog. Squish squelch as we walk walk walk. Our boots are small, so waters squish over the boot-tops, squelch down in our socks. Wet socks are not good, but needs be. MotherFather say, “WeChild, the walk is long, but needs be.” They say, “WeChild, there’s little food, but needs be.” We all carry on. Needs be.

in faith

my ancestors traveled

from Scandinavia

to America

New Year’s should be new, right? Like fresh and magical and better. And I know that’s bullshit, but for some reason, I still download a new app, something to tell me to drink water or exercise or floss or some shit. I want to believe I can change, can rise like a phoenix or a sun or something, but we’re just sitting on the couch.

The temple gleams white. It is a castle with flying buttresses, friezes, rows of columns jumping from Doric to Ionic and back. There is a modern, sloping roof, its clean line cutting through the ornamentation. Steeples shoot up to the sky, chasing each other heavenward, until finally, on top of the tallest one, the Angel balances. He is golden, a trumpet pressed to his lips. Above the entrance I read, “Wholiness to the Lord, the House of the Lord.”

That day on the walking, bright sunny day walking, trees overheard, walking, I see jackdaws, yes? Bold blackcaws, yes?