GRANT CLAUSER 

GRAVITY

Sometimes water comes up

from the rocks, tumbles

a few feet over moss and old

chestnut leaves then disappears

again into rocks. If you listen

carefully you can hear it

traveling under your feet—

a creek that light doesn't touch

and all around you the forest

leans in as if helping to keep

that secret. It's good to understand

the hidden workings of things,

like the heart, how it beats

all day long even though

you rarely see any blood.

Or love, how sometimes

it's enough to feel its resistance

to change, the way gravity

holds together two moving

bodies the cosmos wants

so badly to pull apart.

Grant Clauser is the author of four books including Reckless Constellations and The Magician’s Handbook. His poems have appeared in The American Poetry Review, Tar River Poetry, the anthology Ghost Fishing, and other place. He works as an editor and teacher in Pennsylvania.