There Was No Possibility of Taking a Walk that Day

photo by the author

Title of poem from first line of Jane Eyre

Instead, there was a possibility
of quiet, & building, like one
could do with their hands, a
steeple with their hands. So
many nights I build a steeple
with my hands, & I look upon
the green rocks I gathered, now
on my desk in the safety
of a wooden box, & I remember
the cool beach, how well
my body responded
to the cool beach, but also
the hole in my body,
some would say it resembles
a moon; there was a possibility
of a shape filling the hole in my
body, & it did, & there is so much
I remember when I build my
steeple—my first girlfriend, her arm
around my waist, happy, outside
an extended-stay hotel; a man
I loved, climbing over river-logs
with me, sharing the challenge
of lifting our silver canoe; there is
a possibility of flowers when my hands
build a steeple, of forgiveness,
or feeling God in another person,
it’s possible, my hands show me
it is so, the shape they make,
how sincere, reaching,
remembering what it
was like to be touched.