Not Even the Palm Tree Noticed

my house sat

lost between

   the palm trees

   planted by mother

in her thirties

 

I was like my father

   venturing lands without moving

     each page a new journey

       to a strange land

 

Was I who I am

or who I wanted to be?

 

I was like other boys

trapped in a world

    where the sun,

      like a hummingbird,

        rises and floats away

 

I learn the faces of numbers

  bodies to explore and tuck

     I am an archaeologist

I dig and reason and find

history in what the earth

has swallowed

 

but one day    a girl stood outside

of my house     a blooming hibiscus

in the rain    removing glasses

from my eyes

 

I can still see my change

   beneath that palm tree