In a Sweater Poorly Knit

In a sweater poorly knit, and an unsuspecting smile

Little Moses drifts downstream in the Nile

A fumbling reply -- an awkward, rigid laugh

I'm carried helpless by my floating basket raft

Your flavor in my mind swings back and forth between sweeter than any wine, and bitter as mustard greens

Light and dark as honeydew and pumpernickle bread

The trap I set for you seems to have caught my leg instead

As you plow some other field and try and forget my name, see what harvest yields, and, supposing I'd do the same

I planted rows of peas, but by the first week of july -- they should have come up to my knees but they were maybe ankle high

Take the fingers from your flute to weave your colored yarns, and boil down your fruit to preserves in mason jars

But now books are overdue and the goats are underfed... the trap I set for you seems to have caught my leg instead

You're a door-without-a-key, a field-without-a-fence

You made a holy fool of me, and I've thanked you ever since

If she comes circling back, we'll end where we'd begun

Like two pennies on the train track the train crushed into one

Or if I'm a crown without a king, if I'm a broken, open seed

If I come without a thing, I come with all I need

No boat out in the blue, no place to rest your head

The trap I set for you seems to have caught my leg instead

I

do

not

exist

only

YOU

exist