A Small Exchange (poem)
A Small Exchange
A small exchange between the gutter and the feet
Wet hosiery and someone letting off corrosive mirth
And so having blocks to go
She felt uncondoled
I mourn with you among strangers
Waiting for a split head to hiss out the steam
That boils it
The curiosity of this fall of flint
Nick, nick, nick, everyone’s raw, isn’t enough
To make the chaining crowd cool its wrath
The wrong step forced by a veering in her path
She thinks sometimes she wakes up caring
Maybe in a dream recalled
On the screen without the barcode
Possible humans
Who had spoke their hearts in thumb-taps
Forgiving, as the whale might
Forgiving, bearing all…being wise
Here in life
Every noggin bobs on its crooked stalk
And shakes into the weak planet’s crust
An anticipatory groove
Positioning the intake at one remove
A Small Exchange
Boat Rentals (poem)
(2018, Stephanie Foster)