Heather Christle, American poet, born 1980. She is the author of four poetry collections: The Difficult Farm (Octopus Books), The Trees The Trees (Octopus Books), What Is Amazing (Wesleyan University Press), and Heliopause (Wesleyan University Press). Her first work of nonfiction, The Crying Book, was published in 2019 by Catapult in the US and Hanser in Germany. It is also being translated into Dutch, Korean, Spanish, and Turkish, and adapted for radio by the BBC. ON A WALK
Heather Christle
Heather Christle
My child is upset that they cannot jump over their shadow.
They want me to help them. They want me to teach them
how it’s done. The best I can do is an invitation
to jump over each other’s shadows instead. This satisfies them
for a moment and then the moment is gone. In sunlight
my shadow loves to give me a little dose of sorrow,
the beams having traveled so far only for the lump of me
to get between them and the ground. They came so close.
If I were the earth I would resent me too. My child
has gone into the next moment. I have to catch up. They say
they are riding a horse. They point and it drags them away.