EARTH

My life is getting small on me,

the seams will burst.

I'll be a perturbation in the air.

A child will shiver for a moment,

wondering, before she reaches for a sweater

and goes out to play.

What if fallen leaves could swirl the other way

and reattach? If raindrops could reverse and fill

the clouds, if rings of ripples could retract

and be a dimple in the pond,

the stone that made them

flying out of water to my hand?

The children grown,

I'm free to be alone

in all the sadness I was born with,

genes engraved

in kamenets-Podolsk.

I can't tell love from need.

If I were capable of love...

Earth--when all the dust and gases settled,

were you glad or just surprised

that you were born?