Still not here.

A young boy chasing gulls and other birds

A distant woman winces at every step, a test
of the muscles she made unknowing

which grow and develop a memory
of stairs right before her eyes. These

are treacherous times and the oystercatchers
know it, fleeing his golden curls

with pupeep-pupeeps; and the gulls know it,
in and out of flight as easy as the concrete

steps will be for him in years to come.


in absentia