The Year
       

                        I broke every window.
The year I stole every library book.
The year I lived below the El,
always the hum, running through and by
of people who desired to be arrived.
I couldn't see them but knew wanting.
The year I didn't sleep.
None of this tells how on the tri-corner of 23rd,
Broadway, and Fifth I called into the gusts
my fault my fault.
None of this says sorrow. And means it.
Trains run through me. I am not a train.
Air touches my skin. I am not sky.
I don't need to believe each time I curse
God, or go home with a stranger,
or refuse decision
the spaces in my body widen, are deep like a well,
bone dry, and halfway to China.
I've done nothing wrong. I've done it all.
Redemption, take my name.
Ask me inside. Let me enter.
A house inside a house.
A prayer inside a prayer.

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Copyright © 2021 Joshua Rivkin All rights reserved
from Suitor
Red Hen Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission