Back to Life
[ excavation ]
the land gives up
femurs we left behind
•
a past life seized
the attic wincing
•
in morning sun the croak
of bodies unrelated
•
in a ziploc bag the femur
sweats back
[ you were saying ]
I can’t help but work the lighter
while you sleep to passive tones
•
of public television oil-based primer
oil-based primer oil-based primer
•
is somehow all anyone is thinking
the unpacked clocks tick a person
•
ascending stairs feeling is lost
in the hands we spend hours trying
•
to will objects into motion
sniffing a lock of hair you eye
•
from the velvet wingback the animal
shadow go on test the light
•
with your hand in the air trust
in matter’s habit of obstruction
[ light ]
having migrated beetles rest
on the wall the kitchen overhead
•
their hub in shifts
they worship the bulb
•
my ramekin waits
to collect the ones that fall
[ chronology ]
your loafers caked in drywall mud
I peel bark from ancient studs
•
the walls are patched but gypsum
dust stalls the vacuum cleaner the smoke
•
detectors I cradle a bar of the old
roughcoat horsehair thrown
•
in wet lime this hill before
the network pipeline throbbed outside
•
our bedroom window this hill before
stampede shook loose the stone
[ the passive ]
like cats we avoid each other
the bathroom a time share
•
has it really been three weeks
since the plane vanished
•
it’s time for
a stranger occupation
[ aerial ]
I ride from one state
into another beneath the city
•
that binds them I lose
focus the hemlock-
•
filtered halide carves you
from the dark cathedral light
•
caught in my diamond
on the red line a patch of ice
•
could flip me reckless
from this bridge 
Leia Darwish’s poems and essays have appeared or are forthcoming in Copper Nickel, The Journal, PANK, The Pinch, Southern Indiana Review, and elsewhere. She is an MFA candidate in poetry at Virginia Commonwealth University and serves as associate editor emerita for Blackbird.
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