The Years

Such were they, a dumb stuffed thing

to say, if truth is we all grow old un-

observed, limbs flail only halfway up

a flight, where does dark begin settling

my little bones. I dream and do love

to have them, blue fish

in a lake, my head more tipped up than down

under damp earth. Some days others like deer

from the shot, peeled back, how I

find trees dressed in wild

green light. The years come, unstitched

a face, saddled as one would a heavy beast

for walking. Likely I became then a member

of heaven, put up, the years come and reaching

their long wet hands.

Copyright Credit: Wendy Xu, "The Years" from Phrasis. Copyright © 2017 by Wendy Xu. Reprinted by permission of the author.