Laurie Sheck

[from Laurie Sheck's Amaranth]

Continuum

In my brothers’ arms I was lifted to be tossed in the water,
not to die but to be saved through disappearance.

I thought I heard them calling after me,
my absence would allow them to go on.

Because I no longer need to be touched
I deny them nothing, I watch them when they sleep

and keep them safe.
Sometimes I see their faces pressed into the water’s ceiling,

looking down and down as if to call me back.
Mostly I watch these walls.

Where my brothers live the houses hold their single pose,
the sky is luminous as snakeskin.

So often they find themselves walking near water—
that box planed smooth by sunlight.