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Image: Atomic Taco
The day cracks itself
on my forehead, like
an egg. I feel
the cold of it running
down my cheeks, like
an egg. Who goes
there? A question
I do not speak
aloud, but sense
growing in my head
not like an egg,
like a small capsule
to which you add water
and watch expand
into an approximation
of a giraffe. Water
in this case is time.
The giraffe is the question
straining its neck,
hoping—I must think—
to see. No one
goes there. It was
only an idea,
supple, physical
and loud. And here
lies another: the sky
has no real beginning.
You are in it
even now. Should
anything fall, it
would fall from
the sky. We are
therefore very lucky.
Today is a lucky day.
Heather Christle is the author of four poetry collections: Heliopause and What Is Amazing, both published by Wesleyan University Press, and The Trees The Trees and The Difficult Farm, both published by Octopus Books. Her poems have appeared in The New Yorker, Poetry, The Believer, and elsewhere, and she is currently writing a non-fiction book about crying. She lives in a small Ohio village, which she sometimes leaves to teach.
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