and then I lose an hour to those billiard-trick-shot videos,
magnificent, their impossible spins, flawless timing,
the punctuated clunk of the corner pockets like God exhaling
just a little. I lose another hour watching and another.
Months evaporate this way. There’s the one where the cue ball
kisses every single solid in procession as if in a receiving line
before sinking the eight.
How often do things line up this nicely? Those sticks
you gathered from the yard to spare the mower
and piled behind the barn I let dry and used all summer
for kindling. The rate at which you acquired and I burned
them: nearly perfect. I loved this, the way our tiny flames
merged and conspired while we stood watch. Restless,
prodding. How we let them grow from our little stone basin—
standing up, straightening out as if startled from bed.
Fresh again from summer
and its fields of unrepentant grass,
we strip down in the dooryard
of my little house, check each other over
for ticks. By now we have
outlived embarrassment,
though of the naked pastimes,
this one remains the more intimate:
what shapes we make
in the flashlight’s chiaroscuro,
interrogating every mole, every freckle,
before kissing them, an apology
to the innocent for such accusations.