Esther Sadoff​​

Because I forget how
water flows from a source.
I never said I was efficient.
Memory is never efficient.
The word “never” is a line
that keeps extending.
Why does your book
keep pushing that line?
Water is not made of
the force of its waves,
but of the place where
the pressure builds.
The source is the opposite
of a home. It only shows
where a home might live.

The word “annoying” comes with barbs.
When life becomes annoying,
you’ve lost the narrative;
snow becomes an inconvenience,
gray icebergs plowed to the end
of every street, snow on roofs
that annoyingly drifts into our eyes.
The children won’t stop asking,
“Which came first, the chicken or the egg?
The chicken or the egg?”
But the question is clearly futile.
Exasperated, I say, “The dinosaurs,”
then try to explain. They open the window
to let the snow in, to watch it drift and swirl.
I try to explain. I try to explain.
I want them to listen, to know
there’s so much we can’t change.