MIMES
I open the door to find a storm.
Twenty rooks busy at worms
abandon the green hillside and disappear
in the branches. Even animals who know
their place in the system will hide.
Leaving the trees, they reach
dissonant suspense. It’s a long overture.
With no help from their elders,
they beat their wings and squawk.
Most animals and clouds choose to live
in a thunderstorm with their familiars.
No story I could tell you about
them would do justice.
Still, it’s in our nature to ask them
to repeat their gestures. Birds, clouds,
and other vulnerables
flutter in the wordless present.
Any moment now, they’ll break
character. They teach me how
to behave. I have no double.
They don’t say a thing.
By Nyla Matuk, from New Poetries VI (ed. Michael Schmidt and Helen Tookey, Carcanet)
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