A Brief Word

A BRIEF WORD

It’s not, of course—as we tend to spin

the word—fun. I suppose there might be one

out there who prefers the birthing 

to the birth, but I haven’t found them 

this chapter of earth. Here is the thing 

inside, wild and kicking and wanting 

out, and here—yes, here—is the birth canal 

of a ball-point. Get the point? Hope 

is our only anesthetic. Grin and bear it.

Heads down now, bending to the labor

like more worlds than yours depends on it.

But depend on it: one day, when you fill

the tires and it drives off with a will

of its own, returning to tell you

in its own words what it’s seen 

past the thin margins of this small

town—maybe, even, past the dust-

jacket of soil and sky—you’ll know why.