On Any Day Like Alice
       

No reason to think it wouldn't happen,
then it did. Fault of a loose bootlace
and slipping, her hands groping
for solid ground. Free-fall. Swirling
vertigo of tree roots, beetles,
of green tarantula nests stranded,
catching hold of her hair's
arpeggios. Paisley blouse opening,
the fission of buttoned eyes. To fall
and fall and fall, tug of thick silt,
iron pudding heaving as she hurled
towards the heart. Escape velocity,
imploded planet-mother open,
swallowing the blue pill of her body.
Day, a smoldering crack barely visible
overhead, an angel dissolved. She crossed
herself mid-flight and fell, far
from the known address,
everything until then
that held her to its surface.

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Copyright © 2012 Michelle Bitting All rights reserved
from Notes to the Beloved
Sacramento Poetry Center Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission