attention

i’ve always been the slowest walker.
in any group, it is always me who lags
behind, who arrives slightly out of breath.

it has always been thus. i suspect
it is because i have no expectations
for my arrival. i know what i will find.

therefore i always leave early.
i set the clocks five minutes ahead.
arriving on time means there is still time.

the days are already so full of hurry.
schedules tight like skin, so full,
the pressure of departure and arrival.

everything rushes: the blood in the body,
the body through space, electric synapses,
mid-day traffic, the earth in its orbit.

try to find the still point. take a moment
to breathe, and find the center,
a target for attention, fulcrum.

find a way to measure pace, marking
meter and rhyme, finding the cadence
of footfall and windfall and nightfall.