Report (5)

Night after night earnest stars returned
notched with darkness. Cold miles.
And the need came, for something
whole to handoff: one fruit
rounded by old whispers.
Summer seemed like the full truth.
It was the same day. The same night.
How could we be turning?
We rinsed our palms in the long shadows
at the end of the bike path.
I felt the buzzing of being marked for disappearance.
Lord, I said, flatten me, give me less to love.
Take this dumb root and burn it.

Johann Sarna lives and works in New York. His poems have appeared in Oxford Poetry, Best New Poets, and elsewhere.