HEIGHT / US
by Eric Cline
When we were nineteen or twenty we walked a trail I do
not know the name of and do not care to. At its mouth
there were others, down its throat still some but fewer; by
the time we tripped between its ribs we were the only
people in sight, sound, touch, smell, or taste. Do not
misunderstand me; our bodies were not that which we
perceived, save as omissions
in the grand nothing. We observed the traditions of men
who have loved men before us. A body’s warmth is felt
most consciously as it wanes. To tell the truth you led me
where awe clutched our voices. Ribs are not conducive to
being birthed from, but thrum pleasantly regardless.
Atop the bridge, in lieu of return, you showed me how to
go: breeze, drop, shale.
Eric Cline is a poet. His chapbooks include his strange boy eve (Yellow Chair Press, 2016), something farther across the ocean (Throwback Books, 2017), cicada shell: life in a queer body (Tenderness Lit, 2018), and The Temporary (forthcoming from Glass Lyre Press). A more extensive bibliography can be found at https://ericclinepoet.neocities.org/