i guess my question is
what makes people move?
            what thought
            what spark
            what breath
                        in what language
straightens the bones in their knees and tightens the tendons in their legs like
            strings in wooden puppets
up
            down
up
            down
push
            ­off
lift
            up
step
down

how

do they decide
            where to go?
how
do they know
            it is right?
is it
what they are told?

do they ever make
decisions that are their own?

            i think if
that were true


no one would ever move


all paralyzed
            stuck
            in the pitch on the stairs

calculating
            visualizing
                     ­   optimizing
            philosophizing
ourselves

in circles
            in spirals
                        like drills
                        into the cold wet ground

Storied history.  Water the
color of your eyes.  The
various blues and greens,
the browns are all reflected

in my soul.

You stand in the cold
shallows . I saw you there
a long time ago, freezing
knees and lips.

I had to kiss you so long
on the blanket we wrapped
along your lanky body.

Lake Michigan.  You called
it my bathtub because I was
so eager to get there every
summer.  

Fossils like smiley faces
washed up into my net.
You helped me collect
them along the brown
shore sharp with the

memory of thousands of
years of brilliance,
Of radiant Joy when
the birds arrived, when
the glacier morained
and you and I fell
in love

on the shoreline of
a great adventure.

Caroline Shank

when i tell my mom
"i have a date tonight"
she has one comment:
"whatever you do,
DON'T wear THAT
old sweater
with the geese all over
or THOSE
brown horse hoove shoes
CLANGING like the kentucky derby
with each step
those ones that the bottoms fell out of"
i sigh, wrap the phone cord around my neck
HANG it up, on the shelf
my hope, dignity, cares, whatever
LOOK, a chest
masked by geese flock
feet turned to hooves
a MATING DISPLAY
that only ever works
the lady in the mirror
when she looks
she sees the tips of mountain tops
etched in leather
is taken back to times
where the only sound
was the clank of boots on ground
        the scrape of rocks
        sun on face
where the only sound
was geese on the water
        no where else to be
        but right here, right now
where the only sound
was the ooh and aahs
         of my best friend
         with a big pearly smile
         when i dug it out
         of the giant blue bin
         at the pay-by-the-pound
         laughing while we spun
         theories of eldery ladies
         of its PAST
she mouths to me
"i like your birdleneck"
i mouth to her
"i like you"
and walk out the door