Suitcase, knapsack, handbag, box: what you put things in.
Luggage: what you take with you.

This is how the world is made

After supper, run down patio steps
to where your backyard ends
and the wild forest starts. The air
is thin and cool.

Animals dart their sparkling eyes
at you like bright, shooting fires.
Black walnuts
and apples sit
scattered at the trees’ feet.

Touch them.
Their dried-up cores
are still breathing.

Photo paper

We’ll all think the music’s still playing after we go
and we’ll keep singing.
My mother’s smile,
too, will be like a feather she's holding.
It will fall away softly.
We’ll hardly notice.

Sometimes, you wants your life

To be like you remember it in this picture
of you: starched white dress, socked feet on hot grass.

You make the picture a place, you forget
it’s just a picture. Not
any more a thing
than a locket
in the shape of a heart.


I think you can look at a photo long enough that the moment changes in your mind. I think you can also do this without a photo.