Opening

gathered around the table

at the end of dinner that night

we told jokes and laughed

and i became giddy 

even light-headed

and said “what’s wrong with me?

everything is suddenly so absurd

i feel like i’m high.”

my wife, still giggling, said sarcastically 

“right. there must be something wrong 

if you’re happy.”

vertigo struck then 

when i saw the time stretched out behind me

that it had been wrong

it was impossible to feel happy when

I was waiting for the next threat

but there was a ceiling and a sky 

well above my brow

and the floor beneath my feet

was a surface to traverse

the place at the door was a threshold

not a limit

it’s hard after so long to locate

when i’d contorted and squeezed myself

between these slabs of obligation and despair

when i’d become suspicious of joy

or the junction at which i’d ceased to believe

it was there at all

and then i was back in my anxious skin

listening again to the 

beautiful peals of my children’s laughter

and couldn’t help but smile