My father had a scar running
down his chest, drawing a half-circle around
his navel and continuing down.
At the hotel pool people would stare
but he didn’t mind—another chance to describe
the ill-fated back flip off a ski jump,
and the way they split him “half-way open”
to remove a ruptured spleen.
After the surgery, other organs
took over its work
knowing what was needed,
not involving him in the matter at all.
The body knows things.
A yawn feels good,
that stretch of inhale
working its way through the body,
but even scientists don’t know why humans yawn.
Air into capillaries—
these old travelers,
cascade to the farthest ends of toes
whispering to parts we will never see.
Life wants life the way a valley wants spring.
