Naming
Brandon Cook
Like a kingfisher suspended
to spear the water,
hesitating, hovering,
Is there anything more holy
than a human dangling over the deep,
searching for the right words?
Feeling through herself,
as through a briar,
or like a mountain goat scrambling for purchase
on the unseen ledge,
enough stone to make a miracle—
pendent above death
Like revelation,
Like sunrise:
to name and know what happens within
And as with the fish caught,
there is a trembling and then a lift of wings—
a “yes,”
a reckoning
The mountains seem to rise
and the sun seems to see us
with the thrill of being found,
held suddenly fast
in what we long for—
that somehow, despite it all, we are not alone
That the words find more than sound;
they grasp us
and pull us into warmth like the prodigal come home
The words we form form us
Born into their keeping, we shake the dust off our shoulders,
finding ourselves so suddenly found,
finding ourselves both the speaking and the sound