Cherry-Pick - Brooke Waggoner

Can you hear it?

The soft sound of aging

The watchtower growing watch-less

The cautious losing conscience

In that summer’s eve, in the dryness of the mountain,

Beams of sunshine whispered at my back —

became my captain

So I became a slave

To the one that uplifts and left me cartwheeling

Do you know it?

Do you know the meek ways we have bathing?

The must for hibernating?

The need for book-casing?

I feel i’m getting better,

I feel it in my bones

Inside my body and underneath my clothes

I’m holding out for something

I know nothing of what it is,

and i’m waist-deep in the middle of a mess —

Like a splinter that’s been lodged inside

Burying all the cold from seasons past.