Embedded Files
Cuckoo
Perhaps it is just
my turn, Clock
spurning
its coil, reached on
thinnest chain
spilled, a
silver mound in
the corner.
How
could it have held
the weight, I
thought
, I should, with palm
a landing, have
studied
it, but didn’t.
Unwound now,
polished
Tinderbox,
shape of leaves
are not
leaves, bird in flight,
carved bark fixed
hard,
frozen. I press
my chin again-
st the wall,
I once was tall,
indeterminate.
Tell me
something about
waiting. Cold
pine
-cone bites at my
feet. Tell me
something
about being
upright, sight
a
mechanical whim
, dream of wing
freed
of what made it.
This, too, is
me,
love, time also, all
things expected
to bear
the counting out. How
could I be part
of it?
I have lived
breaking
through
the tree, spreading
light the
bones
of me. Is it
free? I am
not
free. Tree, Wall, spun-out
Clock, gathered
here, arm
, finger, yielded
breast, together
in
a chorus: “We
are here.
Here!
Your place at
the table has
been set.”
Differences
(your hands
The heart going out does not come
back in. drained of
their electrics, a paperweight
resting on the husks of my pages
). Mine dropped leagues into (your skin
the stomach, there it swims
with the other beaten things. was shocked
in the darkness, my hand still
the throbbing engine, exploding tiny sun.)
After all, just a hallway to be passed through
what else can it do but keep going. (you,
There is, yes, a serenity
in the heart’s landing now, just a receiver
somewhere else. of giving, huddled in,
Am I responsible for the stillness of
the gravity of faraway places? a stone.)
The Meeting
The precipice is (playful
pooch, legs flickering, skirts
the edge, the dust chips blink,
gold and red
explosions) real.
Sandy cliff sloughs
off, meeting scrub tree, rooftop,
tar-bucket, stranded
mop, reminders
that rain is
an enemy.
(We dallied here
once, breathless from
climbing up, safe
in distance
of the trail break
-ing, its bounding in,
a mangled wire
trap.) What kind
of flowers
are these,
bundles
of tiny
white pin-
points?
They wink at me
from beneath the
needles of prickly
pear.
“Disturb this
peace, it is not peace
you have been seeking
here,” they are
saying. This
precipice, my one
loneliness
, mountain falling into
town, ground a weakling,
fragile plateau.
I bow to its
impermanence.
Am I, too, destroyer
of rooves? Or just the dust
that gathers? I tuck in all
my wandering
parts, hand to arm to
shoulderblade.
The Sweet Alyssum, Bitter-
cress, Threadstem Flax, that’s
it’s name, will wait
until I am ready
to meet them.
Caleb Scott is a poet, playwright and performer. His plays and performance pieces have been produced and presented at venues in New York City and around the country. His writing has appeared in numerous journals and magazines, including The Bellevue Literary Review, Mid-American Review, Public Poetry Anthology, Grist, American Writers Review, Lucky Jefferson, Ocotillo Review, and December Magazine. His first book, U.F.O., a collaboration with visual artist Jack Warren and photographer Alex Wright, was published by PowerHouse Books in New York and includes pieces of his prose poetry, letters and creative nonfiction. Caleb’s films have screened in festivals all over the world, including the Toronto International Film Festival, Raindance in London, and Cinequest in San Jose. He has been a Finalist for an Academy of Motion Pictures Nicholl Fellowship, a Recipient of both the Silver Palm and Carbonell Award for his work in South Florida theater, and his plays have been selected as Finalists for the Sundance Screenwriters Lab and the Eugene O’Neill Theater’s National Playwrights Conference. Caleb is a Recipient of the ENGAGE Artists Award from GableStage in Miami and the Recipient of a Heart of Art New Works Commission from the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts. He lives in Miami, Florida.
Copyright © 2025 by Caleb Scott, all rights reserved. This text may be used and shared in accordance with the fair-use provisions of Copyright law. Archiving, redistribution, or republication of this text on other terms, in any medium, requires the notification of the journal and consent of the author.
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