With each day’s light

comes the reckoning.

Lids closed, just rising from dream,

the heart lifts like a helium balloon

before eyes reveal

the empty morning,

unchanged,

the same color as yesterday

and the day before.

 

With each day’s counting,

hours wait like cups

to be filled.

But the liquid is mostly

salted tears

or bleach water,

for what is there to do

except weep or clean?

 

With each night’s closing,

calculate on fingers

the patches patched,

the words repeated,

the beans steamed,

the pots scoured.

Thus do the beads of days,

collected on time’s thin strand,

hang heavy as shackled steps

toward the inexorable tomorrow.

 

 

Greetings to new followers, and thank you to loyal readers. —K.