Ezekiel's Wheels

Unwinding

September is running out of days. Each night
the light slips over and under a little sooner,
each day the crisp leaves loosen their grip
and drift downward in slow motion
just as we used to play reels back again
to admire the diver’s grace unwinding.

But I am frightened of unwinding,
divers who disappear. Night after night
on a painted horse I’m dizzy again
going up and down. The music stops sooner
than I expected. Along with the motion.
My hands circle its neck, unsure of my grip,

as if I were clutching at memory’s grip,
confused by my mind’s unwinding:
the music, the carousel, motion
of all my carelessness, days and nights —
how I want to retrieve them sooner
not later, and never let them go again.

What is it that scares me? What is it again
in my slippery mind that cannot grip
and hang on? Or slips from under me sooner
than I am ready, my life unwinding
scrolls of unwritten words. Some nights
I feel like a diver, afraid of motion,

whose grace is lost. And then the motion,
the graceless motion, begins again
and again through theatrical nights
of bad dreams. I’m bruised by the grip
of my struggle with winding, unwinding.
I wish I could heal it sooner

than leaves lose fire. But what we want sooner
comes less and less when we try. Motion
goes nowhere, each gesture of sweet unwinding
is just a gesture of sadness. Again and again
we try it, wanting to feel what we used to. The grip
of knowing ourselves in each other every night.

Every day is like night, when sooner
than I can find my grip, the motion
goes nowhere again, winding, unwinding.