Scout Turkel

Mountain Day

Of course, God was in the kitchen

He was so busy there

I really saw him

Feeling me, too. Hannah,

I have a problem

I only want to write

In our document I know

Where I belong

Snowcaps kissing

Modest black dots in the sky

Performing as birds might

Waving at the mountain

Hannah named while polishing her shoes

I coveted Riley's shirt

The green roof wet

Not at all

Like Creation

It was an accident

That my bangs redefined me

Fundamentally

In the real public

Depression was very calming

The marigolds restored neighborhoods

As lamps would for obedient animals

Of limited and occasional

Vision. I made a list of everything

I'd loved as a child

In the present

Of my life on the mountain

Where I'd never lived

Above anything today

Seeming preferable

To yesterday I wrote to you

Hannah very philosophically

There was applause and then

These unanswerable questions

About happiness

On Earth

I worried not at all

But felt attuned to you

Staring at me

Through the locked door

I spotted your mask

Hanging off the edge

Of your face imagining

An apartment we could really live in

Together thinking between

Many long hours

Of much needed music

Then sleep