Weight-Bearing

I came off the curb wrong—the foot

expecting level, finding the slope

of the gutter instead. I caught the hood

of a parked car, and the rope

of balance went. Warm metal

under my palm. I let

the street settle. The detail

I needed: no one yet

had seen it. Walked the rest

of the way doing the math—

how much to put on it, the test

of each step. The aftermath

of the ankle's first opinion.

By the time I got in

it had its own dominion:

a throb behind the bone, thin

and low and consistent.

Not pain exactly. More

a formal insistence—

the body, keeping score.

I sat on the floor to take

the shoe off slowly. I hit

the wall with my back. The ache

already into it.