to survive not getting what you want
requires a decision from you,
one that will enable you to believe
there were too many obstacles
for anything to really come full circle;
if it happened too soon or too late,
it doesn’t matter, so long as it didn’t happen
by what you would consider
a sensible standard, a reasonable choice

sometimes I wonder how much we are able
to devise from plain sight

language doesn’t know the truth of your
behavior, nor does it care if you pushed too
hard or if you didn’t lift a finger;
it knows you will call out to it, feed it like
you would a dog, conditioned to receive
what it can, grateful even for imperfection —
it knows what tricks to perform, and it
will deliver them obediently, to you

sight is supposed to make everything clear
and tangible, and yet…

there’s something about our eyes, our sight,
tho, that marks tragedy harder on our backs
we want to see but we’re afraid to look;
we want to look for but we’re afraid to find
that tiny piece of information we’re
eluding in order to be right and to feel right,
even if everything is clearly wrong — a tree
rotting through every branch and every fruit
standing tall, surviving, but barely