the space we each hold as the single brick missing from the tattered foundation is neither an enthusiastic lightbulb, nor a wounded elk, rotting to the sound of the birds.

it's my favorite portion of dinner,
the determined phone cords wrapped around my weightless ankles, and the child in my head skipping stones on a purple, moonlit lake

we are uncomfortably wet grand-masters of the sandpaper landscape,
making sense of that nameless, empty space.