Upon Departure

Upon Arrival

Holding the marble up to the light, she says,
“Before, it was just glass, but against the sun,
it is an entire universe.”
and suddenly--dancing in the warmth
of illumination-- I see
a thousand pockets of air,
a thousand breaths in the tiny sphere’s life.


Upon Departure

I wonder, as she pulls the marble back
into the shadows of her palm,
if the many villages--the nuanced worlds--
are, at present time, recovering from
the blinding trauma of their
quick thrust into the foreign heat.

Casually, she drops the marble
into a small satchel, brown and leather
dangling on the sharp bone that is
the meeting place of her shoulder and her neck.
I do not hear much of what she says next,
instead I ponder--to what gods those villagers
must question such cruelty.