calmly (poem)

calmly

rise, this is the answer

tell yourself I’m better, I’m free

Free to go, yes? Yes, one white-clad figure

addresses, the others ignore

yes, through those double doors

keep walking, painless arches flattening

back straightening

Please. I want, you say, finding the way

cordoned, by strange gryphons

To go home.

Why? So promptingly the question

from the winged door-warden comes

you are no longer sure you belong

you have no picture of it, a house

watching the street traffic calmly carry on

you will work at this new job through eternity

rescue the molecules to assemble the ordained

Eurypterus. This monster-scorpion won’t sting

He is larger than the souls of men and finds in them

playthings

Not your concern, but the claw of anchoring earth beseeches

the clay shapes losing names before eyes still

as missing friends…no, worse

I had children I made human beings

October

October

answer

(2020, Stephanie Foster)