Recast, Again
       

You are your father's broad back
                                rewrit in small script. Your feet, like his,
grasp the soil, confident
            the planet will never spin too fast
                    and throw you off.

I never was so sure. I spent most of my childhood watching
                    the clouds
                    revolve while I stayed still.

                                In this way, I was always an observer. In this way,
                                        it didn't matter
            if I watched my mother crawl
                                the hallway's length
                                                on her hands and knees
                    while my father yelled

                                                or watched my father
                                                        put his face in his hands
                                                at my mother's dramatics
                                                while a phone rang unanswered.

                    Both versions were true
                    and neither could touch me.

I do not want anything to touch you.

                                        I want you to know
                                the clouds move
                        because of the wind, not because
                                                the ground is shifting.

It doesn't matter
                        whether she reached the phone
                                or if the phone's ringing was a detail
                                I added over the years.

For years, I told myself if I'd just answered the phone
                                        a voice
                        on the other end would have told me
                                how to exit this scene,

but now I think I would have heard
                                your feet running toward me
                        through the wet grass.

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Copyright © 2019 Rebecca Hazelton All rights reserved
from Gloss
University of Wisconsin Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission