bubble

When dreams have shattered or illusions have been broken,
we say the bubble has popped.

But watch one do it in slow motion:
first it bends to accept the pinpoint thrust,
then unpeels from that spot like an opening eyelid.

A herd of droplets gallop away along the retreating edge
like a wave cresting in reverse.

The beauty of a bubble is not
its symmetrical balance of complementary and opposing forces.
It's this inevitable moment.

When a bubble bursts I don't see abandoned hope.
I see a prisoner set free at last; a captive breath
released into the waiting arms of the open air.

Fate

If I were sinking to the bottom
I would be a flat stone, like for skipping.
I would tip from side to side in invisible currents
wobbling my way down to the silt.

Even in this extremity
even in the face of the absolute final outcome
I would be ambivalent.

“Shall I strike with this side or with that
before coming to my predetermined rest
in a puff of sand?”

In my petrified mind this would matter
intensely.

I would tilt back and forth, wildly indecisive
knowing all along that the angle of my future repose
was already determined by the slant of the sand.

We can’t choose our fate –
only the manner of our going to it.
Do we struggle and equivocate
or seek the swiftest, surest path to the end?