I AM A NATURAL WONDER

I think my heart beats too fast now
post Olympics, pre the swooping
arrival of zephyrs, feeling around for
the gap from which my French
must be spilling. I can barely speak
to my new brother. It’s one week
since they turned on my neighbor’s
prosthetic hearing and what is biggest
is how replete the world must be with
invisible birds and how telephones
have been divested of actual zephyrs.
I don’t get it: If everything is expanding
is my body expanding? Is the atmosphere?
Are the animals’ voices?  Here on the island
of my sister’s wedding everyone speaks
at once. Palms flap like magazine covers.
Grass gets mown by rescuable donkeys.
I had been trapped in the tiny airport for
three days before my escape draped in
women’s robes, my tallest daughter walking
beside me to make my height less conspicuous.
A permanent draft passes between us.
Her voice sounds the most like birds.

*

Graeme Bezanson is an Editor-in-Chief at Coldfront and blogs at ohheyhowseverybody.

Advertisement