the purest evidence - cover

litany after Billy and Jacques

You are the pillows on the floor
The pie crust and the apples
You are the sticker on the window of your car
and the christmas lights on the trellis
You are the soft blankets and the bobby pins
and the tennis balls hiding in the forest

However, you are not the crumbs on the counter
The washrags on the stairs
Or the goldfish hiding in our backyard pond.
And you are certainly not the noises
Of settling dishes in the cupboard at night
There is just no way that you are that noise.

It is possible that you are the squirrels playing in the grass
maybe even the small herb garden
but you are not even close
to being the wind among the evergreens

And a quick look in the mirror will show
that you are neither the colander in the cabinet
nor the whippet asleep under the covers

It might interest you to know,
speaking of the plentiful imagery of the world,
that I am the rumbling of the motorcycle engine

I also happen to be library book on the mantle
the chocolate syrup at the bottom of the coffee cup
the post it note in the kitchen
and the toolbox in the basement

I am also the first ray of the sun
and the swirling eddy in the river
But don't worry, I'm not the pillows on the floor
You are still the pillows on the floor
You will always be the pillows on the floor
not to mention the pie crust and--somehow--the apples.

she asks

Do you know what my favorite part
of that poem was?

It was the part where the metaphor turned
And its hands began trying to find
The edge of the curtain
To pull them back
And show what it was
You had been getting at
in all those lines before

It was the part where your mouth
Stopped working properly
It was the part where your chin
Didn’t move in exactly the right way
And your lips curved a bit late
To form the sound of the words on the page

It was the part where your eyelids
Became a little heavier
And a little less focused

It was the part where your heart
was getting in the way of your words
And it was trying to say
Two things at once

You were to reading the words to the poem
You had written
And at the same time
You were describing the wings
You saw unfurling from my shoulders