The melting sun inserts a butter knife
into chill layered clouds, pries them apart,
spilling light into once subtle windows,
dropping globes of yellow to float on waves
and in isolated puddles. Insert
broken poem fragments into my knee joints.
“Strange adventure,” to the left, and again,
“Strange adventure,” to the right. Off to the
summerlands. Away to the ice. They used
to be twins, but life has beat them up in
different ways, and they wear their nobbled scars
distinctly. Is that why they ache? Swelling
with bruises and shivering with questions.
The hinge of words swings back and forth, creaking,
unable to decide what direction
they should take. My knees argue, unable
to agree on where we’re going. They want
to take a vote, but it’s just them, the two
of them. They aren’t listening to me, or
anyone else. How can I walk, half snow,
half heat? Freezing and melting, refreezing,
melting. My knee buckles, bending wrong. What
would it mean to bend right? Would it feel strange?
Rosefire Rising 