Vapor

Tonight I’m to occupy a single breath:
to let it slowly out as an open kettle might
release its steam, left long on the stove.
Eventually all substance turns to vapor

& accumulates in the air, then falls
again as a globe under its own weight.
Bodies must be near each other, it seems,
even when the result is simple collapse.

Only the globe is never falling—
it’s the thing that imitates the globe
falls into it, as I now imitate, & fail,

the voice of my father, who sits breathing
with his dog at the mouth of the river.
My breath, too, rises & falls. Listen.