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Poetry

If you expect
the open air
and find instead

your feet
fast in the dust
so that you slip

at great speeds
down a hard sky,
then love it.

Rebalance
on your three
left feet. Extend

your right three
tenderly, tapping
one black tip

at a time.
And the glass
is good, as is

your belief
in the unseen
edge, over which

you’ll stumble—
unspanning
on the force

of your own wings
(glass-free)
and the grace

of the sweet air
that was always there.

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The Image archive is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts.

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