Simon Fleischer’s most recent poem to appear here was “My Grandpa’s Moans” (December 2018).

Valley
By Simon Fleischer

Growing-over, tree-spotted, valley
great bowl perched on a lip,
gravity-defying curl of green—
To forget you is to wither.

It’s hard work to get here.
so twice a year, maybe,
I drag my thickness out and up.
Twice a year, maybe, I return.

Sitting on this fallen tree,
these angles foster memory,
Rorschach shadows splayed
across the valley.

I look up. I look down.
Not even outstretched arms
wide enough to hold it all.
Can’t quite make this valley mine.

Somewhere, nothing is forgotten.
Each breath you take,
each step you take, climbing,
it’s all there in the valley.

But here, to climb again is to forget again,
to remember is to let go of something precious,
to love the land is to lose the land.
Here, we are always returning.