this morning my body wrapped like a cord
like something caving in on itself
the little stone in my chest knocking in its cavity
and though the sun strikes white-gold
on the evergreens and a man on the radio
mentions the Academy of St. Martin
in the Fields, and i think how nice it must be
to stand in the fields, how all our academies
ought to be in the fields, where we might
consider the lilies and learn––
now another man is speaking of “last night’s
massacre,” as if it were a nightly occurrence,
and then the music comes on, the fierce beauty
of an orchestra, the luring cry of an oboe
and i am lost––the little stone grinds down
there is something i cannot recover from
something like knowledge, or blindness
something like wandering while the world
keeps flowing past my door
it holds me in its teeth like a riddle
write me, tell me the answer
by Maxima Kahn, first published in Untitled Country Review
