What You Find in the Mud
Poetry is what you find in the mud
in the corner, overhear on the bus,
a woman scratching her ankle, her
breath heaving from walking uphill.
It lives in the glint of a knife, gleaming
against the skin of a pear, how it
trembles before being peeled, the
peel curling toward the hand’s heat.
There’s a man shouting at pigeons,
his face red with all the rage of
a life misunderstood. He stops when
he sees me, eyes wide like forgiveness.
Poetry is the flutter of an eyelid, the
brittle gasp of winter breath through
a wool scarf, the way shadows throb
against a lit window—aching to be known.