FROM THE NINE-TO-FIVE SONNETS [3]
BY NORA ALMEIDA
the regular wheel and the grindstone, original punchclock, machine,
conveyer I am writing over and around the space
where your leg meets the rest of you, the wind
weaves through the buildings like electricity and draws
the road up with its accompanying noises, sings the thought,
quiet heart, hollow bones, cautious
warmth in new spring with airplanes overhead. I once saw a video
of a man being swallowed by the ocean in it
he is holding a sign but the words are in a language I
don’t understand he is facing away from
the water and towards me, you, whoever is watching the long arm of water
reach out and lift the man and his sign—captured in
the same mechanism, wheels, language, eyes squinting
into the camera, arms holding the sign, not disappearing, not disappearing