You shouldn’t choose

To be thrown down

That flight of stairs

Not the one to the right

Because it’s too much too soon

It’s an ocean you move into slowly

So the water gets used to you

One body part at a time

It can’t be that which anyone dives into

Because there are too many bumps

Too many sharp corners

You will bruise so black

That every part of you

Will look like a sky a flutter

With black birds

Take the left if you must be thrown

The left is a lazy lay where everyone lies

Waiting for warmer linens

To soothe cool jade

Where there is no prince

And no penultimate.

There is only the last

In all its deceiving descending darks

So consider abandoning

The theater of the thrown

I’d very much like the likes of you

To try to clutch the right

I’d very much like the likes of you

To try the ease of ease

And let yourself be washed