Becca Klaver
Up to Us
Honey our flask has always been lovely full.
Honey, we can blame it all on the moon—
it's up to us. Who else is here? The cat but
how she loves letting it all fall up to us
like vapor ribbons from the radiator. Honey
your limbs stopped burning on you today
when it's so freezing they might've fired you up.
When someone comes up to us and asks for
change, it's you digging in your pockets while
I stand ruddycheeked and steamybreath'd, idly
dreaming of a changed world. You're no secret to
the universe but how I'd love to get you a spot
on a cosmic agenda; raise the motion of you;
have the rest of the world install you someplace
permanent, epicentric, like I knew at once to do.
When We First Met
I had seven shutters
Shuttered in my chest
Love was a cool shudder
A cough that whooped
The boards opened one-by-one
Like boxy wooden petals
Like you walking in & out
of a swinging saloon door
The seven-layer saloon door
That held my defense
That now clatters wildly
In the wet spring wind