To Unknown from New Wanderer

by Marin Hart

there are buttercups high and dry on the cliffs of my city.
plastic refracts rainbows long and lean as perfect summer days.
in the street there aren’t enough pieces to gather. my body says i am chaseable, sure to land on
the ground like a monarch’s wing pulverized.
i find myself a daughter with empty arms. can you take this with you up the hill? he asked, head
rolling apart from his body, gaze creeping up my legs.
it is full of food for the girl in the cave, i yelled. A little girl who will have a sister.
a fire festers in a trash can burning delicate circles on the fingers of those scavenging.
city hall stands as a building survived the mouth of a toddler. the spit has grayed down, leaving
men’s throats dry and change unspeakable.
sometimes the bus is so crowded that the noise of everyone’s stories makes my teeth whine in
purple frequency.
i walk alone without the presence of safety, that tall red god smiling clementine smiles.
the train leaves without me again. i’m raw and noticeable as an orange tongue.
i do not notice the silence of winter until the white-winged dove repeats its call, both a knocking
on a door and its swinging open.
when i return home, the bird, now luminous and holographic, sits on the sapling outside my
window.
the tree stays leafless long into spring but returns each year from suspected death.
the bird and the tree keep watch,
guard my thoughts,
but make no move to smooth my mind waveless with the tips of their wings.