Object, Conceal Yourself
by H. R. Webster
On the window screen balanced between two ladder-back chairs
I spread the beans to dry. When the man picked up the wax violin
from Mario Merz’s Spiral Table and it crumbled, irreplicable, his only answer
for his actions was “I didn’t think.” Without internet in the mountains
I thumbed the bitter nipple of my mind all day, unable
to not be human, to undifferentiate. I knew the names
of 2-3 trees and it was starting to ruin the forest.
When I came home I watched 12 straight hours of police brutality
on my phone while the beans dried. I was frightened,
at first, to realize that there was no way to be good.
Slowly it became exciting. Pulling the ticks
from my body and dropping them into the crystal bowl
of soap on the windowsill—its incoherent blue illuminating
the far wall—braiding onions, yanking the mallow
from the strawberry bed. When the protestors
were trapped on the highway the cops
pulled them off the sound barrier to mace them.
They dragged the screaming woman from her car then filmed
themselves comforting her child. No one noticed
the violin was missing from among the fibonacci
sequence, the abundance of green apples. I could not lead an ethical life.
My paltry beans, my desire to vanish, my desire to appear
good. My shadow ran away from me, even as she broke
on the boulders and the trees.
I spread the beans to dry. When the man picked up the wax violin
from Mario Merz’s Spiral Table and it crumbled, irreplicable, his only answer
for his actions was “I didn’t think.” Without internet in the mountains
I thumbed the bitter nipple of my mind all day, unable
to not be human, to undifferentiate. I knew the names
of 2-3 trees and it was starting to ruin the forest.
When I came home I watched 12 straight hours of police brutality
on my phone while the beans dried. I was frightened,
at first, to realize that there was no way to be good.
Slowly it became exciting. Pulling the ticks
from my body and dropping them into the crystal bowl
of soap on the windowsill—its incoherent blue illuminating
the far wall—braiding onions, yanking the mallow
from the strawberry bed. When the protestors
were trapped on the highway the cops
pulled them off the sound barrier to mace them.
They dragged the screaming woman from her car then filmed
themselves comforting her child. No one noticed
the violin was missing from among the fibonacci
sequence, the abundance of green apples. I could not lead an ethical life.
My paltry beans, my desire to vanish, my desire to appear
good. My shadow ran away from me, even as she broke
on the boulders and the trees.
H.R. Webster is the author of What Follows (Black Lawrence Press, 2022). Her poems can be found in POETRY, The Iowa Review, The Offing, Ecotone, AGNI, and Guernica. Her work has been supported by fellowships from the Vermont Studio Center, Monson Arts, and the Fine Arts Work Center. H.R. lives and works in New York's Hudson Valley.