Orange
This is an alternative route to the stars
start with your absence and climb,
climb the ladders of air and ascend.
Somewhere your mother is calling you.
You are in dungarees and playing with
a stray dog by the ravine.
Your shirt is orange, your mother
bought it after your father left you,
the doctor said it would cheer
you, as if orange was somehow broader
than the corn fields or the lake at dawn.
Fold this map into your veins, fold it
by melting it and see your name
disappear into a road leading south.
You cannot drive anymore,
the directions are so faded and the smells
of gas, upholstery, dust, and heat
make you think of your father's strong hands
gripping the horizon like a wheel, or your
small heart when it was emptied of everything.
Somewhere you are eating oranges
and the juice shines stars on the skin.
You burst your tongue and your lips
on this over and over again,
you have to find the taste to orange
and survive it.
Page(s) 18
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