in the middle of the road,  

fur wet and flattened to his head, bug eyes  

big as maggots, wide and     afraid 

we slow the car down not to hit him and he  

scurries away all     hurry          

                                             hurry          

                                   hurry. I’m  

 

nothing but scurry these days, checking  

clocks compulsively, rain  

turned to slurry on grey streets, my cat shaking  

his paws when he sees snow  

for the first time.                      Rushing  

through days like a chord progression  

on a piano I never learned to play. My  

 

mom asked if she could give it away,              what 

with it doing nothing but collecting dust. I said okay, after all 

the keys haven’t been tuned  

since I stopped playing. Something about  

 

rubber duckies on the dashboard, the fickleness     of innocence 

that evades me even when I close  

my fingers around it, swear I’m holding tighter  

than anyone else ever has. And yet  

it drip      

               drip      

                            drips out of my hands.                        I remember  

 

the broken faucet in the lake house, 

wouldn’t you believe it? I 

haven’t been to the lake in     years, days and nights,  

full moons have passed me by so much that I barely remember  

 

the itch and                   ache of algae                 on my skin, and 

what my dad’s voice sounded like when  

he told my mom he loved her, how it  

tickled         my fingers and felt like craving 

in a way nothing else ever has to me. Something 

 

about the fact that I’ve spent my life  

trying to forgive the people I can’t                  escape, 

and rushing to leave the only ones I can. Maybe  

just to say I could.         Maybe                              I let go because 

holding tight scalds and my palms are so scarred now 

I don’t remember what they used to look like,   

what’s it matter, right? It             drip      

                                             drip          

                                                          drips out  

 

anyway. Can you believe my sister’s got a new baby? Her neck 

drops to the side when you hold her, like severing 

some red string. My favorite  

sweater’s been unraveling for months. I’m still not fond 

of change. I’m forgetting every day  

 

what it’s like to stay the same, and who I was 

when algae sent sopping chills  

down my spine and my fingertips grazed  

the side of slimy docks. Everything just keeps 

 

changing. The lake to algae,  

the trees on mountain campus to burned bark, to the bitter smell 

of something hot and wanted and                      lost. The opossum  

to road and back to dirt again. It’s a random Sunday in winter  

 

when I realize I’m capable of missing her. And wouldn’t you believe 

my Masters acceptance letter has a typo when I get it 

and I still say                              let me in. Because  

all my life has ever been  

is begging.