Game

by Rebecca Blake Title

All this frightful
fluttering banter
Free-falls like a
Waterfall upon
Silent ears. Child agape
At a chessboard.
Where is the Queen?
Where is the Queen?
He twirls the bishop,
Marches him down the
latitude of red and black checkered squares.
Like a brushstroke, or
calligraphy, or dancing.
Last summer he was in
New York, on the streets
With a man full of longevity
Who told him about the frontier:
The exquisite earth
Below the rubble.
Flabbergasted, the boy disbelieves.
Monet, he knows, is fine,
Sacred even. Meant for galleries,
Like chess moves.
But the earth is dirt and rain
And butterflies.