Twenty-four Views of Hesitation

1/ —in the subtle manner of silence

2/ —the pause between breaths while motioning underwater

3/ Sudden awareness of the stillness of a room when turning to the last page of a book.

4/ or the murmur of cigarettes after nightfall, lifting their smoke against drawn curtains, coiling gently around lampshades.

5/ A patterned rush of moth wings in midflight against the backdoor porch lamp, flashing out against the Midwestern night.

6/ As the velvet scrape of a cat’s heavy tongue across her new born litter.

7/ —the silent pause between lightning and thunder

8/ his hand rising out a motion, following the curve of his lover’s shoulders, guided by the thin exposed spinal trail, the startled intake of breath as fingers lower—

9/ the interval between the ocean’s pulling away, coiling under, an intake of air

10/ before the exhale, of the bow’s release, a slight thrust of a clover bee into the nectar pod of its first exposed blossom,

11/ seeking closure after the final toll of a temple bell, at the height of an hour, the call to prayer,

12/ as the edge of the thin boundary between sleep and awareness

13/ or the hand trembling, hesitating over the blank page—

14/ the nervous pulse of an addict seeking the good vein— his needle ready, trembling—

15/ or the half seconds between past and present,

16/ the manner a narrow tongued owl hulks on a branch as a part of the full tree— until it leaps off into the night,no longer a fraction of the whole— a shadow in deeper shadows—

17/ for there exists a brief span of silence between prey and hunter, before the devouring

18/ perhaps as the needle arches to mend a dress hem

19/ —with the rhythm of falling into sleep, before a full immersion, there is a slight pause, a slight hesitation, then the plunge—

20/ the hesitancy of a stone skimming close the water’s surface— caught between rising and falling, acceptance and denial,

21/ or the brief moment the cusp of the descending moon leans a little closer to the horizon, mere seconds before contact

22/ a pause

23/ a whisper

24/ a gray curtain