Smoothed for gripping is not for resisting what would
you resist: wood of which you are made you must be
inside of:
each one has a name by virtue, is species
inside of one larger: the woods, not for resisting
but who?
The answer is granter not elsewhere, is gripping
its species before it is person
learns wooden from made from: this is a tree.
Amanda Auerbach is a poet and literary critic currently based in Maryland. Her book What Need Have We for Such as We was published by C&R Press in 2019, and her poems have appeared in the Paris Review, Kenyon Review, Conjunctions, and Fence.
