wire.
When I was younger I once said
to a newer friend who was seated sidelong
on the pavement:
the body is connected at the joints,
through ringed sockets and
upon stringy wire,
so that when I splay my arms for your appraisal
I become misshapen,
a leaden reverb traveling upward from
the tender earth as I rise.
And whether from the posture or
the pulpy sound of the crack of bone
I cannot find the totality of my
strength to stand, I
think of the heat of the pavement,
the unfettering of those wires
no longer taut as I begin to fall.