print previewback DAVID MOOLTEN
The Kite
Rather than zoom off into Tuesday
I hovered faintly trembling
as she grabbed handfuls
of beige couch. Just edging along
doing what everyone does
sooner or later with one scuffed shoe
then the next, she bounds in my footage
like a doll-sized deep-sea diver
across a no-frills vintage moon.
My father didn’t suffer
the same obsession with being there,
maybe a generation thing
or just his walking out in the end.
Lungfish who barely crawl still manage
to evolve. But even taking steps
to be different I feared I mostly loitered
long enough to smile before drifting off
like those kites I wish I’d flown
with him, running to get one
in the air the way I had to take two
or three strides for each of his
through lumberyards and barbershops.
Far places exist in the universe
of the possible only moments away
and every evening I climb
from my car like a man who can’t move
fast enough before the years
are up, learning all over
where now, what next,
the moon like a kite above. 
Camouflage
The Kite