Sharks in the Rivers

by Ada Limon

I cannot tell anymore when a door opens or closes, I can only hear the frame saying, Walk through.

Sumptuous mountain, midnight milkweed, come to the valley of neon and no-crying. I’ve got this big city in me. Pretty on fire, pretty high-wired.

You come home on the train and you have bought gifts and tried to be decent. This is how your life will go, you know that. Day after day. Awful acceptance: the soft life of your footprints. You start to think of the alternative, you shake your real shirt off in the hallway.

Why must you exist, so I can exist?

I must know that I have not dreamt you, that most stories are at least half true.