Sport 40: 2012

Andrew Johnston

Beware of wolf logic
as you would be wary of

bumping your head in the mountains,
reaching for something to say—

wolf-teeth in your shoulder
wanting you to howl:

make yourself a mountain—
full of weather, but

a mountain,
even so.

Every gesture offers
this possibility

but there will be no applause
for even the most beautiful of your thoughts—

the one in which you wash ashore, beyond thought,
and set off into the hinterland

of laughter and
suffering. So

in advance, over and over,
forever let me say bravo.

Whatever you do don’t
do that—

Charlie hurts, and Charlie,
the mention of his name—

he got sent off
to hospital—

if you see Charlie
but you won’t see Charlie—

he was brown,
I broke him down.

I was angry with my brother—
couldn’t he see? I had so many bags

to carry across the hills.
There was nothing he could do.

He tried to give me money.
He was not my brother.

Then my anger left me, it was just
something else to carry

up the steep ridge that fell away steeply
on both sides of the family.