Suddenly I felt I had to prove something
and I went from cupboard to bed stand,
to coffee mug and desk to find what I thought

had been missing from my life
as though I could find it
where I had spent most of my hours.

I sharpened a pencil, I plucked
a guitar string, though nothing seemed to be
different from what had always been.

I said mountain and desert
as if the two contrarieties
would offer me a doorway
to a sideways landscape

though everything stood as it was
while I counted my breaths
without keeping track of the number.

Then there was a shrill sound
at the window, a blue jay’s screech,
a shadow of wing tipping the balance.

Then the noise of the house readjusting its planks
and sunlight falling on the kitchen floor
and my fingers running slowly
along the smooth apparition of morning
without knowing why.