The Cracking Place

        Here's the new rule: Break the wineglass
        and fall towards the glassblower's breath.
                                —Rumi

If the old rule was to fight the shattering,
or to cry over the milk puddling across
the table and to the floor, become instead
the milk. Seek the table edge and come
to an agreement: without me, there is
no you. When I fall, you cease to matter.
So you are no longer contained, except
within your own arced boundaries.

If the old rule was to loose the slowly
straining curve, wonder in the patience
of cooperating with the air. Give yourself
to the waft of a lazy fan and you will
find your own edges shrinking as your
helplessness dries. The table will be
big enough once you stop fearing
the brink. Once you determine your own

thirst, and choose not to drink. After all,
it was the thirst that got you here, not
the breaking. Not the fall. When we get
what we wanted, we begin again. Find
the cracking place. Find the thin veneer.
Remember that the edge cannot exist
without your teetering flutter. Make
your pact. Break the glass. Break another.

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Copyright © 2015 Ruth Foley All rights reserved
from The Southeast Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission