Deep Answers

(Artwork: “Deep Calls to Deep,” A.S. McGuffin)

If only I had thought

flippers, goggles,

sleek dark wetsuit, 

I, too, might have left

a familiar landscape–

squared fields, curved islands

dark against ice-covered water–

with slow, fluttering kicks.

I, too, might have risen

through twilight blue air

until I broke

the surface

to breathe.

But no,

my childhood imagination was tethered

to reality, even in sleep:

To escape men in black, swastika’d uniforms,

I ran–just so–on the front lawn

(it was always only the front lawn), jumped–

just so–step, bound! and my legs drifted

up until I floated, prone,

so my arms could arc, curve, pull, 

propell me through

the summer–always summer–

air…

never fast enough to evade

those black-coated I knew were after me,

who grabbed for my ankles

as I struggled

against the nightmare whose one escape

was waking–

(but at least I could wake

and find it was only a nightmare–for me…)

There is, of course, so much more to say.