Before The Beginning

Before the beginning, we were still educated

or tried to be. When toddlers scream mine

what they are saying is they’ve invented a thing

we call attention. We use claps as drumbeats

to give a rhythm to the lullabies of cooking up

stories. When I say dragon, I mean where

were you before you burst forth into life?

Were you in school learning to breathe fire?

*

There is a time for everything. Look, just today,

we saw a fox serve tea and my hand pretended

to be a raccoon with friendly eyes that sipped it,

and you looked at it, admiring its grey and black

stripes, it’s white moon cupped eyes. Then,

you pulled jacaranda flowers up by the root,

and dropped a mass of coloured petals just here

in the kitchen where we sung until you said no more.

*

I heard it said that an education that is genuine

can become innate. For example, when I watch

the garden where our acacias seep gum and send

their bright red seeds in parachutes on the wind,

I can understand it is beautiful, I learned that from

somewhere. It’s the same place you came from.

Before the beginning, behind the veil where we

suppose we looked at each other up close and chose.