appealing

The Maynard
Spring 2016

Simon Perchik

*

Your shadow spreads across
the way this hillside
once it catches fire cools

half molten rock, half
your usual breakfast, no plate
no table, just a few hours

boiled in beach grass and the smell
mornings once gave off—you
are always lost, moving things

an arm, a foot, until the air
is bitter, has no salt, no smoke
—nothing’s left in you

—even if you want to be alive
this darkness will call you back
is already reaching up, swollen

from emptiness and your throat
opened for paving stones
you don’t know how to narrow down.