& why shouldn’t joy beget more joy in the strange and cold streets
where water has thieved the leaves and pushed them into storm
drain, & why shouldn’t I understand life & the way it folds together
like origami so that a wing of a bird is also the crease of my neck
& the grip of my fingers, & if I could go back, I used to say I would change
so many things, but you are in the house onto which you put my name
& soon crocuses will push up & out & make their way toward sun
& death, & why shouldn’t I be ready for that, too, why shouldn’t I
understand that this was always the way it would be: beginnings &
endings & nothing in between, & I have tried to hold on to everything
& am only learning now how impossibly the tree outside our window
yearns for sky & rises, & how I must do the same, even without
joy that begets joy, even without hope that begets more hope,
even on cold and strange streets where I will walk & where I am
floating now, understanding what will become of all that warm rain
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 28, Issue 1.
Shuly Cawood is the author of the memoir, The Going and Goodbye (Platypus Press, 2017). Her creative writing has been published in places such as The Rumpus, Zone 3, San Pedro River Review, Prime Number Magazine, and The Louisville Review. She received the 2014 Betty Gabehart Prize, and her website and blog can be found at www.shulycawood.com.
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