To Human (v)
Praise is not enough,
language is delicate, vaulted,
soft as silhouette
and just as lonely.
Rockface, daybreak, tide’s
out, cacophony
of sparrow song.
I trace the glance I carry,
or try to. What the sea
reveals: the spiral shells
of hermit crabs make a sound like rain.
To Human;
to cage light in language,
to taste the textured skin of things,
to try and tilt time toward
mercy, remembering.
.
Threshold
How long will I stand in this doorway, not coming
in or going out, while the cat is calling to be fed,
and the small girl seems so adamant to disappear.
The man, lost in his own mind, holds
on to the hem of mine, though the threshold
leaves space for only one
breath before letting go, and beginning again,
one breath that says I was outside, now I’m in,
I was inside and now I’m gone.
While the snow zig zags
on the pine boughs outside, their trunks
thicken and the days roll by hungry.
How can I leave her here?
How can I stay?
© Emily Kedar
Emily Kedar is an award-winning, internationally published poet and essayist. Her work can most recently be found in Living Hyphen, The Mountain Bluebird Review, and The Maynard. She is a merit scholar recipient at Pacific University where she is currently pursuing her MFA.
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