Sally Bliumis-Dunn – Ⅳ

 Tell it Slant

 

 

 

 

 

 

Have to sail at an angle,

 

never directly into the wind –

 

 

 

other things too –

 

 

 

can’t look right at the sun,

 

the world, only visible

 

in the light that falls around it;

 

 

 

and in books as well,

 

the best drawn characters most often

 

evolve through indirection:

 

 

 

a lipstick smear on a collar,

 

contents of a bedroom drawer;

 

 

 

I imagine a single

 

two by twelve board

 

I need to lean against a barn –

 

 

 

it won’t even stand unless

 

I place it at an angle.

 

 

 

I don’t know how many other

 

things like this are true,

 

 

 

but I like trying

 

to see her words –

 

 

 

the tall right triangle the barn

 

and board create together,

 

 

 

the purple tufts of clover

 

slightly darker in the grass.