By the time you wake,
the day is already a question.
Whatever declaration there was
in your dreams has already
curled itself into a question mark.
No matter how you wrestle
with the punctuation—try,
perhaps, to straighten it
into an exclamation or crumple it
into a period—regardless, the day
insists on being interrogative.
And why shouldn’t it
insist on being a curve
like a river bed,
like a nautilus,
like a naked breast
beneath the ultrasound—
nature despises a straight line.
Now what matters
is what always matters—
how will you meet the day?