the reins
BY JAY DESHPANDE
They came out of the sky last night
in droves black droves
like birdsign. And placed me back
in a house on the mountain
forming erudite arguments
for a future I don’t own yet
and may never. This is how an old man
losing sight still rises in the morning
remembering the way he soaped the flanks
of a horse he called Granada, a horse
that didn’t belong to him. That same
motion every Sunday. Circling and back
to front. The fine dark hairs caught in the foam
on his palm. How the creature shivered slightly
sweat rising to the surface
while its small and dogged brain
thought about a diamond, a diamond.
