By Karl Zuehlke
A word rests on my tongue like a stone.
I open my mouth and it is still a stone.
I can write it out for you in cursive.
The way a ghost inhabits an outcrop of stone.
In a fever dream as a child I reached
toward a shut door and my arm was stone.
A field scatters into a flock of starlings—
pewter wings, inset bands of iridescent stone.
I was still until I knew I was
all that was still. I heard extruding stone.
If you lose your hand, make dice
from your knuckles and bet with stone.
When the sky zeros in on me
I rub my eyes now that they aren’t stone.
Clear insects and clear lives drink darkness
dripping from dark ceiling stones.
You don’t know my name. You don’t know
what I sweep across whetstone.