Maybe We Poem by John Courtney

were wolves without howls.

Maybe we were stones that doubled
when hatred crashed out of classroom mirrors

maybe we were broken glass
psyclopsing in the rented mouth of bulldozed words

maybe we were shipwrecked authors
seating worlds carefully into glue-eyed bottles

maybe we were bottled catfish floating
whiskers-up in the shade of Jupiter

maybe we were failing waters
as junky gods shot spider lightning into raining veins

maybe we were naked windows
shivering in the doubled storm.

Maybe we are hammocks gently snoring
on the secret islands of sleeping minds

maybe we are church bells in Tupelo;
the cotton sound of dragonflies vibrating the honey sun

maybe we are shadow traffic controllers
guiding moth-shaped ancestors to porch light runaways

maybe we are star-bellied foxes
digging hungry to the boneless moon

maybe we are dirty-minded engines
roaring heavy to the skinless voice

maybe we are pink poems
tied loosely to a canvas of bones

maybe we are picnics in the timid heart
boldly eating diamonds from a factory's broken eyes

maybe we are children catching
stones instead of throwing

maybe we are howls without wolves.