Questions For A New Year

Is anything
real to us
if we can’t
touch it
and call it
solid?

Have we turned
our lives
into a sieve
so fine
that we call it a bucket
and will only accept
what it catches,
ignoring
the many things
that slip through?
What will we call
the wetness
that is left upon us?

How shall we explain it
to our children
when we’ve denied it
again and again?

What if we tear a hole
in the bottom
of our belief
and let everything through?

What if we’re thereafter
soaking wet
all the time,
shivering and cold —
or what if we’re suddenly,
beyond our experience,
deeply happy?

What then?

Here’s to that breaking
and its resultant minefields.  Here’s
to a calendar
slipping off the wall
onto the floor —

here’s to this date
and this hour full
of torn metal
and rushing water,

and whatever comes after.