After Two Years Traveling Abroad, Woman Found Hanging From A Tree by Aaron Brown


 

I can see your gaze out the window, the silences
            of a house that hasn’t waked,

the straight-planed walls with interwoven leaves dancing

            wraithlike—

the pre-dawn moment when the earth lingers undecided,
            as if waiting for light

                                                or nothing at all.

You felt it too, the fear of confinement that comes after knowing
            so many cities, so many streets;

                                                                        of being

tied down: the feeling that drives you into the wilderness—

            drives you to do something the others wouldn’t dream.

These walls know their bounds. This land is measured, acred off.
            Even the floorboards have mouths.

Will we ever be content, you and I?

 

 

Aaron Brown is an MFA candidate at the University of Maryland and the author of the poetry chapbook Winnower (2013) as well as the novella Bound (2012), both published by Wipf and Stock. His work has been published or is forthcoming in Warscapes, Burningword, The Portland Review, North Central Review, Saint Katherine Review, The Penwood Review, Polaris, Illya’s Honey, and The Prairie Light Review.