Page from P. Gasparis Schotti’s Physica Curiosa, 1662
Image courtesy of the Biodiversity Heritage Library
our bodies felt the roll of the tundra
the smell of the snow on our lips
the breath in the mitochondria
of all our histories
and roiled with traumas of the belly
the breaking of the stomach open
to the sky in half-sleep
the vulnerable soft body
the way the air gets colder
when the partner leaves
the way the air is always getting older
golder and heavier with sorrow
the pillow and its stars
the tears it’s kept and is keeping hidden
secret like any trapdoor in a mystery
we can’t wait to watch unfold but clench
our toes against the terror
the way any person holds themselves
protects the ribcage
trying to fall away as if
into bright air or coffee-dark dirt
the roots sticking out and brushing
the elbows as we plummet
the light in the hole above us
gets smaller until it winks out
and our rabbit bones are left
with little fur on the heels
the grass we ate in summer
the snow under our long feet
so unlucky and unlikely to repeat the year
the same way twice
or make it to a third
while all our longing and decisions
make a nest underground
dead grass and leaves and the softest fur
only predators dream to peel away and eat
we are so hungry for what leaves us
what has left us but also what won’t leave
as if it’s food and we can’t live
unless we chew on that green worry
until we can no longer taste
we are so full of chlorophyll and the world ends
in the dream of making our dead come back
haven’t we all seen the peculiar hop
of that kind of animal awake in the dark