Disposed
Gear adrift I say—a phrasal anchor in me & here at the summit no one I know knows what it means. I stay neat & ask What did I imagine better before work before that last time breaking One Tuesday I volunteered & never again The drumbeat softens & I still decline to admit how cowardly & shipwrecked I feel so many miles from the equator How fast can I choose differently a presence I pretend In the darkest sweater I own I'm almost cold
Copyright © 2018 by Khadijah Queen. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on April 3, 2018, by the Academy of American Poets.