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i

Not yet the years worked down to sand.
Or earth, packed & paved, longing to shift or breathe.
Not yet soil, broken & tilled, sprouting to green.

Not still the motion of scrape, of grind.
The moment of hands, cupping.
The moment that called skin cells to linger,

For sweat to salt the nooks & crannies. Not now
In the dead breath of builiding.
In the kingdom of drawer and false light.

ii

Rise. Why not just rise
toward light & weather?
Through clay, through sand.
The layers that learned you
Then shifted away.

Think of the god you will turn to.
The hand that will find you.
A voice that could name you.
From there the world leans closer
not away.
Why not just rise?